Media and Blog Articles – part 2 of 11 (Year 2015)
You can access all years at this link: Media and Blog Articles – Links for All Years
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Media and Blog Articles
EmBee suggested that it would be good if there was a thread for new articles, so that people would be aware of where to comment. So, I created this permanent page. You could mention such articles in the comment stream for this page, or if I see one on another thread, I can copy the link to here. I’ll keep adding to the list, but not deleting, so we’ll end up having sort of a “bibliography” too. [Note: Some articles are not open for comments]
For more articles on FATCA, enter FATCA into Google then click on the link “more news for fatca” just below the most recent featured article.
Note also: JC suggests to see #FATCA on Twitter for latest breaking news. JC finds that is quite a good source and there even are some international articles that one may read using Google Translate.” Others may help certain tweets and articles remain in elevated position by retweeting them.
Be sure to read the comment stream for this thread — there are usually very recent articles mentioned there that are not yet on this list.
2015.01.01
Raising revenue off Caribbean backs, Bruce Zagaris, NationNews, Barbados.
On or about 2016.01.01
16 issues to make 2016 candy for the market, Westfield Times.
2015.12.31
Tax reporting norms: FinMin updates guidance note on compliance, K.R. Srivats, Hindu Business Line, India.
2015.12.30
Top Tax Blogs from 2015, Tax Connections. (Congratulations to John Richardson and Lynne Swanson who placed 2nd and 4th!)
Global dragnet puts pressure on tax evaders as year-end deadlines loom, Jeff Gray, Globe and Mail, Canada.
IRS Employee Whose Job Was Assisting Victims Of Identity Theft Charged in $1 Million Identity Theft Tax Fraud, Paul Caron, TaxProfBlog, US.
How America’s Wealthiest Are Saving Billions Through a Private Tax System, TruthDig.
RA Returns Home, TaxProTalk forum.
2015.12.29
For the Wealthiest, a Private Tax System That Saves Them Billions, Noam Scheiber and Patricia Cohen, New York Times, US.
IRS Stirs Up New Crisis With Non-Profits Over Social Security Numbers, Eric Pianin, The Fiscal Times.
DNC Must Heed Warning Bells From 2000, Bennet Kelley, Huffington Post, US.
2015.12.28
IRS Creates “International Practice Units” for their IRS Revenue Agents in International Tax Matters, Patrick Martin, Tax-Expatriation, US.
MF investors: Les than a4th comply with US tax law, Jayshree P. Upadhyay & Ashley Coutinho, Business Standard, India.
IRS service should improve after some saw their ‘worst tax season,” advocate says, Robert Schroeder, MarketWatch, US.
@ Bob
Ah, the old “do unto others as they do unto you.” That’s Christian charity for you in 2015 😉
Wow. Robert Stack says if the EU goes after American companies that’s bad because they will get tax credits and America will get less tax. I wonder how he squares that with that whole FATCA thing.
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/899a9c6e-6750-11e5-97d0-1456a776a4f5.html#axzz3nHbzQgzn
Let’s face it. That whole tax credit thing is confining governments to small tax boxes and they just want the money to pay for people like Stack.
@Neill
Well, IMHO this is all really about the fact that the U.S. simply cannot find a way of reforming taxes, so they have to jack up the fines on any rules they have, preferably from groups whose members often lack full political rights, like citizens by descent and greencard holders. There is no hope of tax reform for at least another year. With a current federal debt/GDP ratio of of 101, the U.S. government is really lucky that global interest rates are so low and undoubtedly wants to get its debts paid off before rates rise.
@Publius,
They have to reform taxes. The pace of companies leaving the US is quickening. Since the president and treasury acted to curb inversions the rate of foreign takeovers has increased. The WSJ covered it recently.
Foreign companies look at American companies and they are great to buy. They will suddenly become more profitable and less constrained when they become foreign. So the best bids will likely always be foreign. So they bleed companies. I thought I saw news yesterday of Ryan and Schummer trying to put something together.
One hope for Obama is that the OECD screws it up by punishing companies themselves with their new CRS/beps crap.
http://www.msnbc.com/morning-joe/watch/jeb-on-syria–2016-and-if-hes-having-fun-536106563698
does Jeb mean territorial tax for all, or only corporations?
So the priority areas for the IRS looking at tax exempt organizations includes checking the FBARs are in order if they do anything foreign:
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-tege/TEGE_Priorities_for_FY2016.pdf
>International: Issues include oversight on funds spent outside the U.S., including funds spent on
>potential terrorist activities, exempt organizations operating as foreign conduits, and Report of
>Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts (FBAR) requirements, enforced through compliance
>reviews, compliance checks, correspondence audits, and field examination;
I like the way they expand the FBAR to be “Report of Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts”. Just slip in there the need to report everything since the name didn’t convey that. Many people just assumed bank accounts so just pretend it says something different.
Who cares if it’s a charity when you can rob them with FBAR.
@not that bush,
He is clearly talking about corporate taxes. It’s his solving the inversion problem. He has a one time tax for foreign earnings. Trump as a forever tax on foreign earnings. I think it’s a rip off to try and take 8.75% of foreign earnings even if one time, but long term territorial is better.
FATCA Court Challenge Fails to Make a Dent
Posted: 10/01/2015 12:27 pm EDT
Cleo Hamel “Tax Expert” aka “Compliancer”
http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/cleo-hamel/fatca-court-challenge_b_8223238.html
Facebook comments
http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/cleo-hamel/fatca-court-challenge_b_8223238.html
Ah, see JC just posted this
Only 2 comments
Another crap article by this author
@ Tricia Moon
Why do these articles start off so promising and always end up with the same repetitive conclusion: comply, comply, comply? Oh, right, because they’re all written by compliance condors – silly me!
Wealthy and thinking of moving to the U.S.? Proceed with caution:
http://www.mondaq.com/article.asp?articleid=430402&email_access=on
@Neill
I hope you’re right that they will actually hammer something out. I just hope they don’t shut down the government again.
Does anyone know what “exempt organizations operating as foreign conduits” means?
@Bubblebustin
Good find. Of course, a lot of it applies to people who aren’t top executives as well.
This TIGTA report pertaining specifically to tax enforcement of non-residents needs its own post:
https://www.treasury.gov/tigta/auditreports/2015reports/201530072fr.html
Thanks for providing, bubblebustin. I have posted for you and us to read here:
http://isaacbrocksociety.ca/2015/10/02/from-the-u-s-tigta-planned-improvements-have-not-been-made-to-manage-and-track-correspondence-with-international-taxpayers/
Thank you Calgary411. Although I posted the initial notification of the release of the report yesterday, anne boleyn provided the direct link to the report specific to international tax enforcement. Thanks ab.
Wow. This suggests the IRS has sent out tax data to other countries:
IR-2015-111
WASHINGTON — The Internal Revenue Service today announced the exchange of financial account information with certain foreign tax administrations, meeting a key Sept. 30 milestone related to FATCA, the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act.
To achieve this, the IRS successfully and timely developed the information system infrastructure, procedures, and data use and confidentiality safeguards to protect taxpayer data while facilitating reciprocal automatic exchange of tax information with certain foreign jurisdiction tax administrators as specified under the intergovernmental agreements (IGAs) implementing FATCA.
“Meeting the Sept. 30 deadline is a major milestone in IRS efforts to combat offshore tax evasion through FATCA and the intergovernmental agreements,” said IRS Commissioner John Koskinen. “FATCA is an important tool against offshore tax evasion, and this is a significant step in the process. The IRS appreciates the assistance of our counterparts in other jurisdictions who have helped to make this possible.”
This information exchange is part of the IRS’s overall efforts to implement FATCA, enacted in 2010 by Congress to target non-compliance by U.S. taxpayers using foreign accounts or foreign entities. FATCA generally requires withholding agents to withhold on certain payments made to foreign financial institutions (FFIs) unless such FFIs agree to report to the IRS information about financial accounts held by U.S. taxpayers, or by foreign entities in which U.S. taxpayers hold a substantial ownership interest.
In response to the enactment of FATCA and other jurisdictions’ interest in facilitating and participating in the exchange of financial account information, the U.S. government entered into a number of bilateral IGAs that set the groundwork for cooperation between the jurisdictions in this area. Certain IGAs not only enable the IRS to receive this information from FFIs, but enable more efficient exchange by allowing a foreign jurisdiction tax administration to gather the specified information and provide it to the IRS. And some IGAs also require the IRS to reciprocally exchange certain information about accounts maintained by residents of foreign jurisdictions in U.S. financial institutions with their jurisdictions’ tax authorities.
Under these reciprocal IGAs, the first exchange had to take place by September 30, giving the IRS a deadline to put in place a process to facilitate this data exchange.
The information now available provides the United States and partner jurisdictions an improved means of verifying the tax compliance of taxpayers using offshore banking and investment facilities, and improves detection of those who may attempt to evade reporting the existence of offshore accounts and the income attributable to those accounts.
The IRS will only engage in reciprocal exchange with foreign jurisdictions that, among other requirements, meet the IRS’s stringent safeguard, privacy, and technical standards. Before exchanging with a particular jurisdiction, the United States conducted detailed reviews of that jurisdiction’s laws and infrastructure concerning the use and protection of taxpayer data, cyber-security capabilities, as well as security practices and procedures.
“This groundbreaking effort has fundamentally altered our relationship with tax authorities around the world, giving us all a much stronger hand in fighting illegal tax avoidance and leveling the playing field,” Koskinen said.
Meeting this deadline reflects a significant international collaboration and partnership with dozens of jurisdictions around the world. The capacity for reciprocal automatic exchange builds on numerous accomplishments including the following:
Development of a consistent data reporting format, or schema, and the agreement to use this format by all jurisdictions;
Establishment of the details and procedures required to assure data confidentiality;
Creation of a data transmission system to meet high standards for encryption and security; and
Cooperation with foreign jurisdiction tax administrations to achieve the timely implementation of this exchange.
Koskinen noted the risks of hiding money offshore are growing and the potential rewards are shrinking.
Since 2009, tens of thousands of individuals have come forward voluntarily to disclose their foreign financial accounts, taking advantage of special opportunities to comply with the U.S. tax system and resolve their tax obligations. At the beginning of 2012, the IRS reopened the Offshore Voluntary Disclosure Program (OVDP), which is open until otherwise announced.
Title had some information also:
IRS Announces Key Milestone in FATCA Implementation; U.S. Begins Reciprocal Automatic Exchange of Tax Information under Intergovernmental Agreements
Usually these notices are available online sometime later than when mail is sent out.
IRS Begins Sending Individual Account Information to Foreign Countries
By LAURA SAUNDERS Oct. 2, 2015 2:29 p.m. ET
http://www.wsj.com/articles/irs-begins-sending-individual-account-information-to-foreign-countries-1443810584
Pay Wall Drill: Enter article title into Google. Select NEWS tab. Click on result there.
No controversy reported here. Kind of boring straight reporting. Perhaps this may be compensated in the comments (hint).
While many have said that FATCA will not be reciprocal, this may suggest that these countries are getting something. One question/comment is that the countries would have gotten the info under existing exchange agreements. The information can not be reciprocal as the US is not forcing its banks to ferret out nonUS persons: Delaware is not asking under penalty of purgery to state one’s nationality (ies) for existing/new account sign up.
As seen through the very exceptional U.S. rose-coloured glasses. Mr. Koskinen, we are not hiding money offshore. We are onshore in OUR OWN COUNTRIES. *&%$# off.
And here it is referenced in the wsj blog: http://blogs.wsj.com/expat/2015/10/02/expat-alert-irs-begins-sending-individual-account-info-to-foreign-countries/. No comments yet.
Our Revenue Minister should be able to verify whether Canada’s gotten what it bargained for. If our elected leaders aren’t going to insist on reciprocity, we should insist they do! It’s obvious that if we don’t make it a sticking point, they won’t!
WTF?
http://www.irs.gov/uac/Newsroom/IRS-Announces-Key-Milestone-in-FATCA-Implementation;-U.S.-Begins-Reciprocal-Automatic-Exchange-of-Tax-Information-under-Intergovernmental-Agreements
@Tom Alciere
Probably only sent info of people with foreign addresses… citizen or not… People with a US addy, trust, corp, or whatever the set up is… home free… they did not break any privacy laws… made a bs start… where as outside the US… they are shaking the tree & mowing us down to throw us under the bus… for the total kill
On the lawsuit in the U.S.:
Attorney predicts ‘long fight’ after effort to block FATCA is rejected.
http://www.ifcreview.com/viewnews.aspx?articleId=10014
@US_Foreign_Person:
Actually, it had always been assumed that the U.S. Treasury could not transfer the reciprocal information without the impossible authorization from the Republican-controlled Congress. It would be illegal to send it; they sent it, it was illegal to send it. Now for the impeachment. U.S. Senator Rand Paul would be the first to start an impeachment if he could, but Senators cannot. Impeachments start in the U.S. House of Representatives.
If you’re in Argentina and you keep your funds in Miami, you don’t want crooked tax agents to find out because they will sell the information to kidnappers. The U.S.A. enjoyed status as a tax haven, past tense, and the Treasury just ruined that.