Offshore setup ideas

[BoboRobo]

Hello,

I am just starting out with my research so doing it in an interactive way might speed things up a bit.

Here is my situation: I'm a UK resident and I trade profitably (my profits exceed the 11k GBP tax-free allowance from the gov). The securities I trade are ETF, stocks, commodity futures, and fixed income futures. I personally use IB (Interactive Brokers) and would like to continue to do so even with my future company.

Here is what I would need: An offshore company in a jurisdiction with attractive tax laws, such as BVI or Cayman islands, and a business bank account that would also probably be offshore (I read that those are usually better to deal with in these scenarios).

Now, the transactions wouldn't be many, I would just use it to transfer the funds to the broker and honestly, I can't think of any other purpose for it right now. After a few years of compounding, I would probably set up a trust to start sending the money back to my personal account.

What jurisdictions and which banks would you recommend for something like this and why?

I know it's a big question and I'm not asking you to do the work or research for me here. I just hope if someone has something useful to share, they would so that we could have an interesting conversation.

Cheers!

 

[BoboRobo]

If u wanna remain anonymous open an American LLC (south Dakota or Wyoming LLC) and a interactive broker account associated to your LLC

Anonymity is not a must but it couldn't hurt, I'll keep that in mind, cheers. What of banks, or in this case, banks that would open an account for a company in those states? Would those only be US banks or could I use something else?

I've heard that for banks you want to go as high as it makes sense for the money you have. I expect my annual profits to be north of 20k GBP.

 

[Sols]

Unless you plan to move away from the UK or at the very least hire a one or two full-time employees for your offshore company, the company is going to be considered tax resident in the UK, which means it has to pay tax in the UK.

Basically, what you're proposing isn't doable (anymore).

 

[BoboRobo]

Unless you plan to move away from the UK or at the very least hire a one or two full-time employees for your offshore company, the company is going to be considered tax resident in the UK, which means it has to pay tax in the UK.

Well, then I'll hire someone.

 

[user9823671]

Well, then I'll hire someone.

Read about CFC and CRS laws. Honestly, with £20k GBP profit a year, an offshore structure isn't gong to be worth it. Once you factor in the hassle of trying to avoid UK tax, probably it would have been cheaper to pay UK tax. Maybe speak to a UK tax consulatant to see what can be done UK wise and how low can you tax be reduced to

 

[BoboRobo]

Thank you. I can see more and more that this is not a DIY kind of thing.

Ok, so one final question. At what kind of annual revenue should I consider optimizing my tax expenses in ways similar to those discussed here?

 

[Sols]

Ok, so one final question. At what kind of annual revenue should I consider optimizing my tax expenses in ways similar to those discussed here?

Quite simply when the costs of doing so are less than your tax burden in the UK. The costs depend on solution chosen: moving to a tax haven (fairly easy with a UK passport, probably even after Brexit) or remaining in UK.

Research your options. Have calls with some reputable, licensed corporate service providers and pick their brains. Get quotes. Most are happy to have an introductory call for free. There is a plethora of nuances to consider

For relocation, I'd say once you're at 50,000 GBP/year or more and growth is on the horizon, moving to Malta and Cyprus can work out favourably. Depends on Brexit.

If you plan to stay in the UK, you're going to need a more sophisticated setup.

 

[user9823671]

If you plan to stay in the UK, you're going to need a more sophisticated setup.

and more expensive. Sols is infinitely more knowledgeable than I, but from what I understand to stay in the UK and stay legal (ish?) the setup needs *actual* substance in the offshore location to show it is not only run but managed from there. The structure would need nominees and perhaps a trust / foundation? I don't even begin to pretend how the bank account would work to keep your name from being reported via CRS, only way I can think is it cannot be you. Every step of this becomes expensive, not only to setup, but do anything. You need something signed, then you are paying the nominees / agent / trust / lawyers to do something for you that would be free if you were listed as the UBO. Again, I don't know for sure, but I cannot see something like this being worthwhile unless you were well into 6 figures profit.

The other side is you go the illegal route with fake documents, which seems to work for some but is not without it's own problems. But to discuss that you need to join the private mentor forum

 

[BoboRobo]

The other side is you go the illegal route with fake documents, which seems to work for some but is not without it's own problems. But to discuss that you need to join the private mentor forum

Sound interesting. Could you explain what is meant by "private mentor forum", please?

 

[user9823671]

https://www.offshorecorptalk.com/threads/mentor-group-for-anonymity.24872/unread

 

[deepsudeep]

You need something signed, then you are paying the nominees / agent / trust / lawyers to do something for you that would be free if you were listed as the UBO.

I looked at the costs for a bvi company with nominee director to be around 3k from fidelity. They did mention these signings would be extra but they didn't mention anything specific. For a trading company with IB the director will not be required to sign anything on a regular basis

 

[Fred]

I looked at the costs for a bvi company with nominee director to be around 3k from fidelity. They did mention these signings would be extra but they didn't mention anything specific. For a trading company with IB the director will not be required to sign anything on a regular basis

The BVI setup won't work with Interactive Brokers since mid of 2020.

They were forced to drop all the island shell companies like Seychelles, Belize.

There are workarounds with creating an office with employee on the island but with this costs you better go with a offshore jurisdiction Interactive Brokers can still onboard like UAE - zero tax and no public company register.

You have to keep in mind that Interactive Brokers don't accept since 2020 any deposits or withdraws from EMI's like TransferWise. Getting a real bank account for a BVI company is additional cost and most likely require significant amount of initial deposit with 6 figures+. Last year it was possible to open BVI with OCBC in Singapore. It was not cheap and much more expensive like the UAE solution - beside of that the BVI company doesn't grant you a residence Visa - we had a call with OCBC in the last days. Starting from this year they don't accept BVI no longer.

To sum up this: You will have huge costs to make shell island setup working in 2021 + it can stop working with new regulations from one day to the other.

 

[Spinat]

If u wanna remain anonymous open an American LLC (south Dakota or Wyoming LLC) and a interactive broker account associated to your LLC

how would that work? you still need to provide all your KYC?!

 

[For Free]

The BVI setup won't work with Interactive Brokers since mid of 2020.

They were forced to drop all the island shell companies like Seychelles, Belize.

There are workarounds with creating an office with employee on the island but with this costs you better go with a offshore jurisdiction Interactive Brokers can still onboard like UAE - zero tax and no public company register.

You have to keep in mind that Interactive Brokers don't accept since 2020 any deposits or withdraws from EMI's like TransferWise. Getting a real bank account for a BVI company is additional cost and most likely require significant amount of initial deposit with 6 figures+. Last year it was possible to open BVI with OCBC in Singapore. It was not cheap and much more expensive like the UAE solution - beside of that the BVI company doesn't grant you a residence Visa - we had a call with OCBC in the last days. Starting from this year they don't accept BVI no longer.

To sum up this: You will have huge costs to make shell island setup working in 2021 + it can stop working with new regulations from one day to the other.

Yes. Not only OCBC but also DBS and UOB. So bank account options for island-based companies are very limited

 

[Fred]

Yes. Not only OCBC but also DBS and UOB. So bank account options for island-based companies are very limited

That's why we say avoid all the caribbean islands in 2021. Simply because you can't find a reliable retail bank that is working with them. For wealth management with expensive private banks of course it's still a option. If you have 100m$ in assets you can still bank a BVI company in Switzerland.

For the average joe with 10m$ the UAE is the way to go for 0% tax, privay, no bureaucracy and normal retail banking.

 

[Roamer]

That's why we say avoid all the caribbean islands in 2021. Simply because you can't find a reliable retail bank that is working with them. For wealth management with expensive private banks of course it's still a option. If you have 100m$ in assets you can still bank a BVI company in Switzerland.

For the average joe with 10m$ the UAE is the way to go for 0% tax, privay, no bureaucracy and normal retail banking.

Having substance in the UAE isn't necessarily cheap (and I mean, enough substance to satisfy an HMRC enquiry).

 

[lory]

Having substance in the UAE isn't necessarily cheap (and I mean, enough substance to satisfy an HMRC enquiry).

Cheap no, it depends on profits made from your business. If you do 200K a month in net profits and you have to pay this guy 10K a year to sort it all out, it's cheap. If you only do 2K in profits a month the guys solution is ultra expensive.

 

[Fred]

Cheap no, it depends on profits made from your business. If you do 200K a month in net profits and you have to pay this guy 10K a year to sort it all out, it's cheap. If you only do 2K in profits a month the guys solution is ultra expensive.

Yearly running costs are as low as 4.000 Euro.

Many people are not up to date about the price rates after COVID.

 

[Roamer]

Yearly running costs are as low as 4.000 Euro.

Many people are not up to date about the price rates after COVID.

I was not talking about running costs, I was discussing the cost of having substance in UAE (for the most part, an office and a legitimate director).

 

[Konstanz]

That's why we say avoid all the caribbean islands in 2021. Simply because you can't find a reliable retail bank that is working with them. For wealth management with expensive private banks of course it's still a option. If you have 100m$ in assets you can still bank a BVI company in Switzerland.

For the average joe with 10m$ the UAE is the way to go for 0% tax, privay, no bureaucracy and normal retail banking.

BVI is better than UAE in some cases. Depends on the business. Don't forget UAE is a sharia law country.
Also is safer to park assets in BVI company than UAE I think. I wouldn't keep my assets in UAE banks. I understand you are consultant of UAE matters, but UAE is not always best choice