http://www.roundtownnews.com/rtn-fea...thorities.html

Reading one of the free newspapers I came across this article.

Apparently a new Royal Decree was approved on 15 November 2012.
It states that all individual assets with a value of €50.000 located abroad as at 31 December 2012 must declare them to Spanish tax authorities by March 2013. This includes all accounts with financial institutions, custodian accounts, real estate, etc.

Has anyone got any further input please?
Once declared will it be taxed?

I would imagine that anyone with a house in UK, even jointly owned, would fall into this category.

I thought that it was always all your worldly assets.

Rosemary

me too.............

Same in France

OK, you always have to declare your worldwide assets but!!

1 this is a new Royal Decree this month
2 it mentions a specific amount
3 it mentions a timescale when you hold the assets and
4 a deadline for declaring them

so what is it about?

Is it a new attempt to get back some money into the economy?

It's a clampdown on people who have money invested offshore and not declaring it which is tax evasion.

The existing requirement to declare all assets is mainly related to wealth tax which was reintroduced last year but unless you have total assets over the tax threshold which is now very high, there is no obligation to make a wealth tax declaration or declare your assets. Any income from those assets would, of course, be declared on your income tax declaration but even then they do not have to be specifically identified.

It think this new incentive is different to the wealth tax requirements and relates to income generated from assets abroad usually in tax havens.

No doubt it will become clear in due course but there would need to be some way of making this declaration. It would not be on your normal tax return unless that is significantly changed and anyway that isn't due until the end of June rather than the date mentioned in the article.

If you have a few undeclared millions stashed away in the Cayman Islands I would be a bit concerned but if you have a semi in Romford I wouldn't panic!

surely all to do with the wealth tax

erm, if you have millions secretly stored in the Caymans, and it's already tax evasion by law, then what good is another law making it illegal going to achieve?

Even more illegal than before? Is that like being more pregnant than before?

??

From what I understand it, the law clearly outlines what the penalties will be

There are 3k euro fines for every piece of information that has not been declared, plus another 3k for every time you have not paid the correct tax

So theoretically, if you have 2 bank accounts in the UK that you did not declare to the Spanish tax office that have earned you 10 pence interest in each one, then the Spanish tax office can fine you 12,000 euros

Its definitely worth while declaring every bank account you have!

Well, that sounds fair. After all, 10 pence is 10 pence. Well worth €12K to make sure its declared and taxed.

But I'd have to think making it that easy to collect big fines makes the chance of error rather astronomical. I'd reckon that nearly every resident of Spain is guilty.

What they are trying to do is persuade people to declare their worldwide assets

Apparently they are going to be quite agressive in handing out the fines. And of course all offshore and non-resident bank accounts are now legally obliged to pass on information to the relevant tax authorities

True to the extent that Switzerland & Liechtenstein impose EU withholding tax on accounts held by EU citizens, and a few Caribbean islands have agreed to reveal account details upon request of an EU government, but most OECD-compliant tax havens are only obliged to reveal account details ONLY when indisputable evidence of international criminal activity can be presented. But in no tax haven is reporting account holders' assets an "automatic" function.

It should be noted that in many tax haven jurisdictions, an accusation of "tax evasion" is not considered legal cause for revealing account holders' identities or even confirming that a specific individual is the beneficiary of an account. Besides, in almost all cases, there is a corporate identity which holds the account, and the actual individual who technically owns the assets is completely off the books anyway.

So again, if you have €20 mil stuffed into an offshore account held by an unrelated corporation, it will be pretty difficult for any government to acquire any useful details. The tax authorities would have to acquire evidence of movement of money between the suspected individual and an offshore account which can't be explained, and start the investigation from there. Most people get caught simply by living a lifestyle they can't possibly afford on what they declare.

In any case, hiding large sums is so prolific these days (millions of people engage in it), that as long as the individual doesn't wave a "tax evader" flag saying "come get me", the chances of getting caught are still pretty nil.

You will find that if you open an offshore bank account nowadays that you need to provide evidence that you are not money laundering, and you must send them your tax number in your country of residence because every year they will send a summary of your interest gained to your resident tax authorities

This is certainly true in Isle of Man, Channel Islands, Gibraltar, Switzerland etc.

KYC and anti-laundering rules apply to all OECD compliant banks everywhere (obvious exceptions are fake banks, which have massive difficulties transferring funds in and out of the system).

But only certain jurisdictions have signed on to the EU savings directive. The channel islands are in that category, along with Switzerland, Lichtenstein and Cayman Islands. AFAIK, BVI, Seychelles, Belize, Panama, Hong Kong and many others have not signed on.

Besides, if the individual isn't the official beneficiary on the account, it's much more difficult to pin tax evasion on them, unless of course, they clearly live well beyond their declared means, which is how most cases are revealed, and eventually are charged.

The other way is through illegal espionage conducted by certain EU governments. Liechtenstein tax affair

I've got an offshore account in Gibraltar and I only had to produce the usual proof of identity and address to open it. No requirement to provide a tax number at all. I was merely informed that the interest is paid gross and it is my responsibility to declare it to the tax authorities.