Since no one has posted officially about this milestone, I thought I would pull it out of some threads for wider attention.
The Treasury announcement that the final regulations have been released has lit up the FATCA Compliance Complex (FCC) Linkedin groups and various tax blogs.
It was reported on at Reuters in the Tax dodge language we have come to expect out of them. Treasury tweaks global tax dodge law one last time
It was more extensively described in an Accounting Today Article Treasury and IRS Amend Final FATCA Regulations
Where this interesting comment was made by an “unnamed Treasury official”
Asked about the increase in citizenship renunciations by Accounting Today, he pointed out that there are a number of reasons why a citizen may decide to renounce their citizenship and expatriate, and there is not necessarily a direct correlation between FATCA and the increase in renunciations in recent years.
Looking for something that more fully explains what this new 229 page document represents, this is as good of an explanation of what was issued as I could find.
For those not versed in FCC language, this description is in the “Say WHAT???” category…
On February 20, 2014 the IRS issued many changes to the FATCA Final Regulations via newly released Temporary Regulations. These temporary regulations reflect changes made to the final regulations to coordinate the chapter 4 regulations with the temporary regulations published under chapters 3 and 61 and section 3406 of the Code modifications to the final regulations to further harmonize them with the IGAs. Several of the changes made by these temporary regulations were previewed in Notice 2013-69, the draft FFI agreement, and certain of the draft IRS forms released throughout 2013.
Attached I have highlighted the significant FATCA changes from the 229 page document: Highlighted FATCA Changes 2-20-14
I saw that yesterday. I’m getting used to ignoring their rantings because when you consider the regular tax code is so many pages it takes a truck to move it and the regulations change every few weeks or months I don’t think anyone knows what they are doing. In Canada I run into people daily who are US classified and know nothing about this stuff, people who should know. I truly believe the USA will be defunct and in chaos similar to Ukraine, Thailand, Greece and dozens of other countries where it has come down to bloodshed and crushed economies. There is no way on God’s green and radioactive Earth that the USA is going to bounce back and survive. Once an empire is in decline it is impossible to make it what it once was in greatness. What we are seeing now is the final moral and ethical decay of the entire capitalist system that is enslaving us. When laws are perverted violence follows. The USA is reminiscent of Caligulas reign. I’m hoping it dies and I get a chance to see it happen.
Also, FATCA is dead unless over 100 countries sign on. This isn’t happening nor will it ever happen. Among those who do sign on there is confusion and resentment. Read this and consider if Obama can’t launch Obama “Care”, a program that is supposed to be computerized, in only one country, what makes him think his IRS thugs can control even 25 other tax depts in other countries much less their banks? Their announcements that FATCA won’t be delayed is a JOKE. If they are able to get it going at all it will be 5 years out. Rebellions are starting over it around the world so can someone explain to me how they are going to make it work at all?
AGAIN, go down and buy physical gold bullion and wait it out. Clear your bank accounts in protest and move to credit unions who have stated in no uncertain terms that they hate FATCA and don’t want to comply. And, a worldwide FATCA-GATCA….ha ha ha, give me a friggen break.
link
http://www.politico.com/story/2014/02/obamacare-affordable-care-act-delays-103787.html
If a legal challenge rules the IGA breaks the Charter, the IRS will have more tweaking to do!
This one too:
http://blogs.wsj.com/riskandcompliance/2014/02/20/u-s-treasury-irs-issue-last-package-of-fatca-regulations/
I was intrigued by this astute comment:
As always with the United States of Hypocrisy, it’s do as I say, not as I do.
@Deckard…
Robert Stack just licks which ever side the bread is buttered, and both sides if he can! It is so perverse.
This whole thing is well thought out scam. Robert Stack is the Frank Underwood of the U.S. government right now. Well, most of them are but, he takes the top spot with his “there are lots of reasons people might renounce” That right there exposes him for a liar when the whole world can see the numbers spiking as they are and it IS due to this and no they can’t help it. He doesn’t care, he sleeps like a baby just as Frank Underwood would do. Removed from the “little people” and zero empathy. They are fast at word turning the U.S.A. into the worlds only remaining tax haven. It’s a scam.
I was away in the US for 4 days last week. In South Carolina they all want Obama out! He seems to be hated and feel the world is turning against the USA because of him and his policies. I told a few about Fatca and they have never heard of it. Once they found out the US is “taxing” people’s income earned in another country, they couldn’t believe their ears. For me, here at home, my MP Joe Preston in St Thomas Ont has not even replied to a written request for a conversation regarding Fatca that was done in his office with his secretary. He knows he cannot answer my question, so dodging me will work. I’ll be in his office Monday morning to get this done. I do not take kindly to BS from my MP. Will keep you all posted.
@Deckard
Thanks for the insight. saw that on Politico and wondered what planet that Treasury official was on. Yes, there are other reasons that people renounce but none of them help to explain the increase.(most people who would be inclined to renounce over foreign policy would have left during the Iraq War). The only way his statement makes sense is if he means that there are other reasons like teensy estate tax exemptions and pre-existing rules against PFICs and FBARs that existed for decades but have only recently been enforced. He is a lawyerr after all.
there are a number of reasons why some think the world is flat
Citizenship based taxation enforced by FATCA will the the end of American global migration. An intelligent answer from this individual from the US Treasury would have included just exactly what what those other reasons are. A smoke screen.
@Petros et al –
Take a look at the just published communiqué by the G20:
9. We are committed to a global response to Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) based on sound tax policy principles. Profits should be taxed where economic activities deriving the profits are performed and where value is created. We continue our full support for the G20/OECD BEPS Action Plan, and look forward to progress as set out in the agreed timetable.
Question:
Is CBT any form of taxation where “economic activities … are derived and where value is created”?
To me RBT is implicit in this statement from G20, of which the US. Is this being addressed or deliberately ignored? Maybe worth a separate posting?
sources:
1)
https://www.g20.org/sites/default/files/g20_resources/library/Communique Meeting of G20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors Sydney 22-23 February 2014_0.pdf
2)
http://www.oecd.org/ctp/BEPSActionPlan.pdf
If I read it correctly, there is an Interesting provision in the additional 155 pages of FATCA regulations issued by the US on Friday. These now say that a FFI has reason to know information about “foreign” status is incorrect if there is unambiguous evidence of a place of birth in the US. But there are now 2, rather than just 1, ways to be treated as “foreign” nevertheless. The first (old) way is by producing evidence of citizenship in another country and a copy of a CLN. The second (new) way is by supplying a certificate of foreign status (W-8), producing evidence of citizenship in another country, and giving “a reasonable written explanation of the individual’s renunciation of U.S. citizenship or the reason the individual did not obtain U.S. citizenship at birth”. Those born in the U.S. who thought they had lost U.S. citizenship when they naturalized in Canada before the change in U.S. law on “intent” may welcome this, assuming their FFI is willing to take a risk about what kind of written explanation the U.S. will consider “reasonable”. So now we have banks making citizenship determinations!!!