Live data from Hacker News

Wealthy Americans Targeted by U.S. in Panama Tax-Fraud Probe

bermudapost.com

21–30 of 67 posts

Re: Wealthy Americans Targeted by U.S. in Panama Tax-Fraud Probe

#21
post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is Switzerland so high on the list? We might have low taxes for companys, but since many years now, other countrys get all information about the customers. So if an us person open an account, they send all information about it to the us. I think this is at least since 15 .. 20 years now.

The score is a combination of the amount of wealth stored and the degree to which wealth is able to be hidden in that jurisdiction. Notice that the US is number 2 on the list. It may be a heavily scrutinized jurisdiction and thus not a great tax haven in the traditional sense, but there are still huge amounts of capital moved there. They can still be useful, especially to move funds away from your country of residenc…

Wyoming, Nevada + some others have strict secrecy laws for LLCs which are great for hiding money from tax authorities. https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2016/04/panama-...

Re: Wealthy Americans Targeted by U.S. in Panama Tax-Fraud Probe

#22

Mapped: The World’s Biggest Private Tax Havens https://www.visualcapitalist.com/worlds-biggest-private-tax-... Panama is the 15th.

Why is Switzerland so high on the list? We might have low taxes for companys, but since many years now, other countrys get all information about the customers. So if an us person open an account, they send all information about it to the us. I think this is at least since 15 .. 20 years now.

The same with why US in no 2. USA is a tax haven for non US.

Re: Wealthy Americans Targeted by U.S. in Panama Tax-Fraud Probe

#23
post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting. I saw it on Drudge Report and hadn’t seen it discussed here. DDG gave it a B+ so I just assumed it was reputable

Looking at Drudge Report was your first mistake

It's good to see what the other team is doing sometimes. I've seen stuff on DR that other places didn't host but was still interesting. It's not in the same OMGWTF category as newsmax or OAN despite what some HN people will tell you.

Re: Wealthy Americans Targeted by U.S. in Panama Tax-Fraud Probe

#24

Mapped: The World’s Biggest Private Tax Havens https://www.visualcapitalist.com/worlds-biggest-private-tax-... Panama is the 15th.

Why is Switzerland so high on the list? We might have low taxes for companys, but since many years now, other countrys get all information about the customers. So if an us person open an account, they send all information about it to the us. I think this is at least since 15 .. 20 years now.

US FATCA treaty to almost all countries in the world only applies to US citizens trying to open accounts in other countries. That is a one-to-many relationship.

The worldwide reality is a many-to-many relationship. Switzerland doesn't snitch on other country's citizens for two reasons:

1) Other countries don't have the resources to enforce a global tax regime. And if they tried, their diplomatic leverage was so weak that it was laughed at.

2) Other countries never even attempted to pass laws for a global tax regime, that is an almost uniquely American hubris, and even with the US's massive resources it also struggles to enforce this stretch of the jurisdiction concept.

Re: Wealthy Americans Targeted by U.S. in Panama Tax-Fraud Probe

#25
post #21
post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The score is a combination of the amount of wealth stored and the degree to which wealth is able to be hidden in that jurisdiction. Notice that the US is number 2 on the list. It may be a heavily scrutinized jurisdiction and thus not a great tax haven in the traditional sense, but there are still huge amounts of capital moved there. They can still be useful, especially to move funds away from your country of residenc…

Wyoming, Nevada + some others have strict secrecy laws for LLCs which are great for hiding money from tax authorities. https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2016/04/panama-...

It's all a matter of reading comprehension. People can have a passing knowledge of "something about Delaware" for the next 100 years and never consider that there are 55+ other jurisdictions under the US brand which aim to be competitive too.

All states, the district, the territories, and even reservations have incorporation laws. The reservations are very numerous and many have not even considered the possibility, just show up and ask them to pass your model incorporation law. This is the kind of opportunity that the US still has. (There are many jurisdictions that have passed good laws, but have incompetent and ill equipped executive branches. If nobody has ever shown up to form their super awesome business type, the public servants in the state might not actually know how to do it. Whereas places with validation like Wyoming and Delaware, can have turn around times of 24 hours for things they do often.)

The other way that the US is somewhat unique, in comparison to other countries, is that there is no way to incorporate a business at the national level. Only Congress can create corporations, one at a time, one law at a time, and Congress has never addressed or delegated this to change this reality. The national government derives its power from the states and has never bothered them over this. (They did recently pass some registry of business owners law though, but it's more of a feel good thing for activists than anything practical.)

The beauty of this is that the US has an easier time pointing its bullying efforts outwards, whereas all US jurisdictions escape scrutiny by the US or OECD or other multinational bodies that put "tax havens" on blacklists.

States compete for business, so this makes more and more favorable business incorporation laws pretty easy to get.

The last thing I'll say is that there are other countries similar to the structure of the US, where there are many obscure states you can actually create business entities in. Some countries have incorporation at the national and the state level, just because the separate jurisdictions passed the laws. Some countries you might not even notice are federations of smaller states. So again, its all about reading comprehension. The usefulness of this knowledge is that some countries brands might attract scrutiny now (ie. "Panama corporation"), while the state level version is completely benign to everyone because they just haven't seen the name and aren't allergic to it.

Re: Wealthy Americans Targeted by U.S. in Panama Tax-Fraud Probe

#26
We all assume they're avoiding taxes but the funny thing about this is that you can treat this stuff like Roth IRAs, just pay your taxes one year and then just use the post-tax money to create entities offshore and hold assets indefinitely.

The IRS doesn't care what you do with post-tax money! There is no prohibition on doing stuff outside the country, there are no capital controls for US citizens.

The main difference is the secrecy and lack of scrutiny. Even if you have judgement proof trusts and retirement plans like Roth IRAs, people still get to know about them. And they have withdrawal restrictions.

So there is utility in disappearing some of the money that you already paid taxes on into a better jurisdiction for that purpose. The key point is already paid taxes on.

Example of utility being when you get charged with something and you get your assets frozen so you can't even pay a lawyer making it difficult to afford your rights as a US citizen. Well, now you can lol because you were still liquid. There are other ways to do it too, this is one way. It takes a pretty weird and creepy level of nationalist hubris to think your money needs to stay in the country, but I would say this brainwashing has been largely successful in creating a stigma at least. Except to people that matter.

Pay your taxes though.

Re: Wealthy Americans Targeted by U.S. in Panama Tax-Fraud Probe

#27

We all assume they're avoiding taxes but the funny thing about this is that you can treat this stuff like Roth IRAs, just pay your taxes one year and then just use the post-tax money to create entities offshore and hold assets indefinitely. The IRS doesn't care what you do with post-tax money! There is no prohibition on doing stuff outside the country, there are no capital controls for US citizens. The main differenc…

As we move more and more towards collectivism... it was never your money... its the governments money.... they just let you use some of it for a time... if you have the right politics and you don't piss off the wrong people. The China model.

Re: Wealthy Americans Targeted by U.S. in Panama Tax-Fraud Probe

#28
post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It'd be a really cool if there was a browser plugin that showed you the provenance of any news you read. Like first appeared here, then here then here....

Block chain is rudimanting about throwing himself into the discussion :)

*Without burning coals in every corner of the planet when a simple trusted db suffices at 0.01% of the cost

Re: Wealthy Americans Targeted by U.S. in Panama Tax-Fraud Probe

#29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Looking at Drudge Report was your first mistake

It's good to see what the other team is doing sometimes. I've seen stuff on DR that other places didn't host but was still interesting. It's not in the same OMGWTF category as newsmax or OAN despite what some HN people will tell you.

Lately I've seen HN people linking to sites like Newswars (which is infowars rebranded, it seems) and whatnot.

> It's not in the same OMGWTF category as newsmax or OAN despite what some HN people will tell you.

Drudge has a history chock full of conspiracy theories, retractions and dirty-deletes. All of which center around attacking liberal politicians or causes to "own" or "gotcha" them.

Seriously, read the list that includes Obama birther conspiracies, Las Vegas shooting conspiracies, "immigrants setting wildfires" conspiracies (from Breitbart), and perpetuating hoaxes like "black man attacked McCain campaign staffer!": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drudge_Report

Re: Wealthy Americans Targeted by U.S. in Panama Tax-Fraud Probe

#30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Block chain is rudimanting about throwing himself into the discussion :)

*Without burning coals in every corner of the planet when a simple trusted db suffices at 0.01% of the cost

But how can you trust the truth if it hasn't been NFT'd?
Post reply on HN