Mercury Bank asking me to have US Operations within two years

[juancho]

Hi there, I just loged in into my Mercury Bank Account and they asked me to questions about my US Operations, indicating that they require me to have US Operations within two years.

Does anyone know what this is about?

My LLC is based in NM, my operations are from outside the US and my clients too. I do not have operations in the US. Would it be enough to have one provider in the US to purchase something from?

Would having a US provider change my condition when filling the forms 5472 and 1120 ?

Thanks!

 

[81PxXLC9Mt]

Would having a US provider change my condition when filling the forms 5472 and 1120

no,

it's only for employees and physical offices

 

[juancho]

Hi

no,

it's only for employees and physical offices

Thanks. So I guess if I have a provider, that would comply with their requirements as far as I can see in that form. Great then

 

[daxbr]

Is Mercury a supplier of services to you?

 

[juancho]

Is Mercury a supplier of services to you?

Well, I guess stating that wouldn't work. Otherwise they just wouldn't ask this questions to anyone assuming they're providers for each customer.

 

[daxbr]

Well, I guess stating that wouldn't work. Otherwise they just wouldn't ask this questions to anyone assuming they're providers for each customer.

You can certainly put them on a list along with other suppliers (data storage, phone, local newspaper ...). They cannot reject themselves.

 

[grago]

Hello, i've asked them if having a provider like a US-based hosting provider would be enough to comply. So far they replied with a generic, evasive answer:

Thank you for writing in! Thank you for writing in! We simply ask this, in order to ensure that your Mercury account is used to operate in this country. In order for you to be eligible to an account with us:

-Your company must be registered and formed in the US
-You need to have or plan to have US operations and/or be serving US customers within 2 years
-You cannot be operating in one of our banking partner's restricted industries or countries

Please let us know if you have any further questions.

So i'm going further by asking them what does specifically mean to have "US operations". I'll come back if i get an answer from them.

 

[juancho]

Thanks!

 

[Heroselohim]

I'm not very sure about the possibilities. But... may be someone might perform a P2P transaction to exchange FIAT with cryptocurrencies with someone from US. For example a Binance P2P transaction. And that may count as operations within US if billed that way, but was just a thought. Yes, you would need to pay the involved taxes for that specific transaction.

 

[koohl]

Why not simply incorporate your business with a Wyoming LLC - they have rejected us a few times before but told us to get a US LLC registered, after that they are banking for us.

 

[jryan54]

Mercury rejected me recently with a Wyoming LLC and pure vanilla e-commerce operations with a U.S connection (Customers and Suppliers). So I suspect they have tightened up massively recently.

 

[JohnnyDoe]

They ask this question to every customer. So far I never had any problems with them. I hope it helps that I have subscribed their recent funding campaign (which makes me a Mercury shareholder and all you guys my customers )

 

[catslover]

I believe that if you carry out a marketing campaign through social networks, then you are paying for services to a company within the US. That should be enough.
In the mail they said:
US operations and/or be serving US customers
That means:
US Operations + US Customers
OR
Just US Operations
OR
Just US Customers

Usually when banks talks about operations they mean transactions, but anyway, will be good to get a clarification from them about this issue.

 

[Deepbarrels]

I believe that if you carry out a marketing campaign through social networks, then you are paying for services to a company within the US. That should be enough.
In the mail they said:
US operations and/or be serving US customers
That means:
US Operations + US Customers
OR
Just US Operations
OR
Just US Customers

Usually when banks talks about operations they mean transactions, but anyway, will be good to get a clarification from them about this issue.

They probably are pressurized by the government to get their customers to have U.S operations (taxable)