Offshore Bank Account where, how and what ?

[bizman]

any suggestions on the wheres, whys and hows of having an offshore bank account ...


bahamas, cayman, nevis, isle of man, jersey? would love to hear some advantages and disadvantages of different countries as well as accounts.


ideally i would like something where i could have funds wired to an account which is tied also to a credit card and i can use that credit card at will.

 

[Spinat]

Sorry for my ignorance ... what is the benefit of an offshore account? I know the US has previously had tax loopholes that benefit offshoring a copr headquarters (a la Accenture and Enron), but I thought they have closed those loopholes in the past year or two ?

 

[clemens]

blueweb, if you don't know the benefit of an offshore bank account, then Im sure you don't need it, stick to your local bank account.

 

[gwenpinay]

any suggestions on the wheres, whys and hows of having an offshore bank account ...

The tax havens you mentioned are great options if you are doing business in those places. But if you are only looking for an offshore account to protect your assets and ensure your privacy, I would suggest banking with the Swiss. Swiss banks allow non-resident accounts and are very trustworthy.

 

[wildy]

May be Liechtenstein should be your choice. They have nearly the same rules and reglements like Swiss banks have.


And they are as trustworthy as the Swiss banks.

 

[webdriller]

Well, Lichtenstein and Swiss isn't any option any longer, what is happening at these places are not good for anyone..


Read what I found:


During Feb. 2008 the German Intelligence Service paid an ex-employee of a Lichtenstein Bank for a CD containing all the account holder information of foreigners having foundation accounts in a Lichtenstein bank. The German government paid this individual either $6,000,000 or $7,300,000 depending on which account one wishes to believe. They did this thinking they would recover hundreds of millions in taxes. The Germans were alleging that there were Germans using Lichtenstein Foundations and banks to evade taxes that Germany imposes on its citizens. The German taxes can exceed 50% and there is a 25% capital gains tax. Thus the Germans motivation. The German authorities had in their possession account holder information on Americans, French, Spanish, Australians, Canadians, New Zealanders, Italians, Finnish, and Swedish citizens who were all turned over to the respective governments for free but some allege monies were paid for the information by the foreign governments.


Liechtenstein LGT Group, which was the bank whose data was compromised, says it assumes the data was misappropriated and eventually sold unlawfully by a Mr. Heinrich Kieber. Mr. Kieber is a Liechtenstein citizen who was convicted by a Lichtenstein criminal court of stealing electronic account holder information from LGT Treuhand, which is a Division of LGT Group, which is the bank. The Lichtenstein’s ruling family, wholly owns the LGT GROUP BANK. The LGT Group has denied breaking any laws anywhere. They made a statement referencing a person hiding money in a mattress, asking if that should that be grounds for making mattress manufacturing illegal. The Lichtenstein ruling family has rebuked the German Government for this deed openly. They say they are a peaceful country of 35,000 while Germany is over 80,000,000 people. They further went on to say that Germany would not solve its tax problem by villanizing Lichtenstein. The Germans have threatened to impose a tax on all monies going to Lichtenstein which is sort of an economic boycott that could violate international law which it appears the acquisition of the CD also violated. Lichtenstein was quick to retort that such a boycott would be meaningless since the money could easily be rerouted through other countries.


LGT Group then went on to make a statement that the stolen account holder data that they consider illegally disclosed to the German authorities, is only the same data that was stolen by Mr. Kieber back in 2002, the crime for which he was convicted in Lichtenstein. It is assumed the stealing of this data violates the bank secrecy laws of Lichtenstein amongst other laws. It is another safe assumption to assume that if Lichtenstein tries to prosecute the Germans for what some may consider to be an illegal way of obtaining this data that the Germans and some other countries may return the favor with some sort of charges against the Lichtenstein Bank executives and owners thus creating a real international scandal. It is most unlikely that anything will be filed by any country against the other country or their key people. It is also being reported that authorities as a result of this incident were searching some bank offices in Switzerland. Nothing other than searches was reported at this time.