Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act - Important for Americans

Over the past year I have made many friends from this forum, and from the meet up group that was created for Expat.comgers. I have loved my time out here in Abu Dhabi, and to be honest long may it continue.

I would like to think over this time I have developed quite a bit of trust with other bloggers, who constantly send me messages requesting advice on a number of different topics. Which is why I now feel morally obligated to mix my profession with my social life, something I have always said I wouldn't do. However, this new FATCA Law released by the IRS, has forced my hand to go against my own rule, to help friends and bloggers avoid heavy tax penalties. I cannot stress enough how important it is for Americans who are offshore, to understand how the new FATCA Law may affect them.

We all know Americans regardless of where they are in the world must pay tax to the IRS. It doesn't matter whether you have dual nationality or even mulit-nationality, the bottom line is if you have an American passport then you must declare your earnings and pay tax. Quite a few Americans have avoided this by not returning to the US, however, the IRS has now grown more powerful than ever before.

This FATCA Law means that all banks and financial institutions around the globe must declare to the IRS of all its Americans clients/customers. They must declare all earnings, savings, investments etc. So now you cannot hide from the IRS. The IRS even have the authority (through the aid of these banks and financial institutes) to freeze your assets offshore (so I have been told).

I am pretty sure you probably get bombarded by people trying to call you to sell you something you may feel you don't need, however, this is not a sales pitch. My daytime job is doing informative presentations, so that I can help keep expats out here up-to-date with the all the information available to them (and this includes knowing Sharia Law). And believe it or not but I get paid handsomely by my company to be able to do these presentations for free.

I know there will skeptical people out there, that's fine, if they don't want to take advantage then I have no problem with that nor will I try to push them, as there is no gain in this for me. But when things do fall apart they will learn the hard way.

I have an open door policy for anyone who would like to learn more about avoiding tax penalties or learn how they could legally pay less tax.

Regards,



Mohit

PS: If you don't believe me then you may want to take a look at the following:

http://www.irs.gov/businesses/corporati … 64,00.htmlhttp://www.forbes.com/sites/robertwood/ … americans/http://www.forbes.com/sites/robertwood/ … crackdown/http://www.deloitte.com/view/en_US/us/S … 0aRCRD.htm

Timeline for FATCA:

February 8, 2012

IRS issues Proposed FATCA regulations.

Spring 2012

Treasury and the IRS anticipate issuing draft versions of the FFI agreement and reporting forms.

Summer 2012

Treasury and the IRS anticipate issuing final regulations, final FFI Agreement and FATCA reporting forms.

December 31, 2012

Qualified Intermediary and Other Withholding Agreements expiring on this date will be automatically extended until December 31, 2013.