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Eric Schmidt has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus

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Re: Eric Schmidt has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus

#381

Post by beagle3 »

jb1991 wrote: post #361
beagle3 wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then you didn’t look. There’s some rule from the ‘1940s which says only a SEC-licensed broker can manage securities for a US tax payer. It was mostly ignored outside the US until 2010 but since then, together with FATCA, is very much enforced. Most of my US expat friends are lucky in that their local banks will let them have a checking account and sometimes even a savings account, but no other services are available…

>Most of my US expat friends are lucky in that their local banks will let them have a checking account No, it's not luck. Getting a bank account is not the chore you are making it out to be. A securities broker for trading stocks -- that I have never tried -- but when it comes to opening a regular bank account, there are no major hurdles whatsoever. Your expat friends, assuming they are living legally in another coun…

I have known. Totally legally residing expats. Everyone who persevered was able to get one, but some gave up after 4 months of back and forth of increasingly onerous requests.

And none of them was able to get any reasonable saving rate - saving accounts pay less than local government bonds in just about every place, but the most anyone was able to get was a savings account with low interest (and in some cases, not even that).

I have a friend in Israel who was born in the US, and has a US passport, but has not set foot in the US since age 6 (40 years ago). It didn’t matter in the past, but over the last 10 years he has been increasingly told to take his business elsewhere by every financial institution; big banks will do checking and saving. Nothing else is allowed.

Re: Eric Schmidt has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus

#382

Post by netsharc »

Retric wrote: post #340
pembrook wrote: post #337

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FATCA compliance issues won’t just get the IRS on your back. You also have to deal with the US department of treasury. The US treasury is not handicapped by regulation in the same way the IRS is. We’re talking extradition and jail time, not just having to pay back taxes. The Venn diagram of banks where you’d feel safe storing millions of dollars and that would also be willing to help you defraud the US Treasury are e…

> The Venn diagram of banks where you’d feel safe storing millions of dollars and that would also be willing to help you defraud the US Treasury are exceedingly small. It’s just not practical. You only need 1. However, the solution isn’t to move money from your account to a bank which then hides what’s going in from the US government. The solution is to make a terrible investment say buying land from Bob for 10 milli…

> The solution is to make a terrible investment say buying land from Bob for 10 million only to sell it to Sally for 5 million.

Or if you're Russian, a condo in Trump Tower, NY...

Re: Eric Schmidt has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus

#383

Post by FDSGSG »

gnicholas wrote: post #314
FDSGSG wrote: post #310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would COVID be perfect cover for giving up your US citizenship? It might be good cover for getting another, sure.

You got it — the timing is good for this step, which is adding a new citizenship. Then he can drop his US citizenship in the future, after his new one is established.

But why would the timing of this step matter?

Re: Eric Schmidt has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus

#384

Post by Fnoord »

gamblor956 wrote: post #368
ratsoman2 wrote: post #363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Panama papers mean nothing to you?

For an American? They mean nothing. The list of Americans in the Panama Papers is extremely small, and all of them shifted their money before 9/11. It's simply not possible to do stuff like that anymore.

Cryptocurrencies get used for this purpose.

Re: Eric Schmidt has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus

#385

Post by ramblerman »

pembrook wrote: post #284
dundarious wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure Erich Schmidt has access to resources not available to your friends. There is absolutely the potential for a tax angle to this application, perhaps involving creating business entities in Cyprus to avoid the IRS's reach. That is of course just my suspicion and I could be wrong, but I think my suspicions are reasonable enough to dispute the strength of your claims ("There is no tax dodge. There is no way to d…

It's amazing to me how strongly people want to believe there's some magical way that rich Americans are avoiding taxes by hiding money in exotic locales. This was possible in the past for Americans, but it doesn't make sense anymore. That's the truth. The secretive Swiss banks and numbered accounts you read about in adventure novels as a kid are all reporting on US citizens now. It doesn't matter how much resources E…

Switzerland perhaps, but there is still plenty of tax evasion going on in the middle east and Dubai for instance.

That being said, I think you are right about Schmidt. It can't be for something so simple, being that high profile.

Re: Eric Schmidt has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus

#386

Post by beagle3 »

fomine3 wrote: post #350
beagle3 wrote: post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But you have to add state taxes - in NYC and CA the state+federal is comparable to European taxes: and in Europe, those taxes include healthcare and academic education, which you pay for independently in the US.

How US unique is that they have tax haven states inside the country.

For companies. The same is not afforded for individuals. A minority of states have no state personal income tax - and in those states, the effective top bracket is indeed ~30% lower than the European average - but these cover a small percentage of the population. NY and CA have rates of 10-15%

Re: Eric Schmidt has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus

#387

Post by hobby-coder-guy »

pembrook wrote: post #284
dundarious wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure Erich Schmidt has access to resources not available to your friends. There is absolutely the potential for a tax angle to this application, perhaps involving creating business entities in Cyprus to avoid the IRS's reach. That is of course just my suspicion and I could be wrong, but I think my suspicions are reasonable enough to dispute the strength of your claims ("There is no tax dodge. There is no way to d…

It's amazing to me how strongly people want to believe there's some magical way that rich Americans are avoiding taxes by hiding money in exotic locales. This was possible in the past for Americans, but it doesn't make sense anymore. That's the truth. The secretive Swiss banks and numbered accounts you read about in adventure novels as a kid are all reporting on US citizens now. It doesn't matter how much resources E…

Which PR firm do you work for?

Re: Eric Schmidt has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus

#388

Post by punkbit »

gumby wrote: post #334
Splendor wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If that were the case, then why wouldn't he try to obtain citizenship in the country he's moving to? Why Cyprus?

why a Cypriot passport he can live in France or Germany or Italy or any other EU state. But Cyprus provides passports quickly. Malta and Portugal are also quite good in this regard.

What makes you think Portugal has this sort of dodgy business like Cyprus and Malta? Mind share some evidence of your claims, please?

Re: Eric Schmidt has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus

#389

Post by m0zg »

michaelrosmer wrote: post #379
m0zg wrote: post #299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wouldn't he be able to form business ventures in Cyprus in which he could own a stake, but which would pay him very little taxable income? Furthermore, wouldn't he be able to grow those ventures and later take a distribution when his pals in US Congress abolish the "global taxation" nonsense? Or alternatively, by renouncing US citizenship? What other reasons are there to seek citizenship in a country like Cyprus?

He can set up business ventures in Cyprus regardless but that wouldn't help him much in most cases as he's then going to trigger all the controlled foreign companies rules and if he renounces his US citizenship he's over the $2 million asset threshold so he'll have an exit tax, I think it's highly unlikely he'll ever do that, though he might be setting up his family members to do so since under most of these programs…

As an aside, BTW, I would not recommend setting up any business ventures in Russia at the moment. Rumors have been swirling that Putin has Parkinsons, and will announce his departure in January. Kremlin denies, of course, but Duma (Russian parliament) is currently working on legislation granting former presidents _very_ broad immunity even after the presidency ends. The fact that they're working on something like that with like 4 years to go in Putin's presidential term is unlikely to be a coincidence.

Re: Eric Schmidt has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus

#390

Post by gawin »

In the Masters of Scale podcast (1) Eric Schmidt told Reid Hoffman in september that COVID-19 is limiting his ability to do what he loves to do to the extent that he shifted his main focus to COVID-19. One of the reasons for this was his decreased ability to freely move around and meet people.

Getting a EU passport makes moving in the EU a lot easier.

1) https://play.acast.com/s/masters-of-scale-with-reid-hoffman/...

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