The kidnapping of Ecclestone’s mother-in-law

The mother-in-law of Formula 1 billionaire Bernie Ecclestone has reportedly been taken hostage for £28 million; believed to be Brazil’s biggest ransom demand.

Aparecida Schunck was allegedly abducted from her home in Interlagos, Sao Paulo, according to Brazilian Veja magazine. The 67-year-old mother of Ms Fabiana Flosi the 38-year-old wife of Mr Ecclestone presumably does not have this sort of money to pay her abductors, but her son in law does!

Ms Fabiana married Mr Ecclestone, 85, in 2012, after he divorced his wife Slavica Radic. He is reputedly worth an estimated US $ 3.1 billion.

Sao Paulo is not new to kidnap. It reached its peak in 2001/2 with more than 300 reported kidnaps a year. However, Brazil is still in the top five countries for kidnap with more than 1,000 reported a year in 2012. The actual number is likely to be many, many times more than this.

Abduction, however, is less common than ‘express kidnap’ which is commonly done by police, demanding the victim go to an ATM at gunpoint to pay to them a ‘bribe’.

Is it hardly surprising therefore with this going by the police, that some countries are refusing to sign a bi-lateral agreement with Brazil for the automatic exchange of information on financial data.

Governments across the globe are committed to the eradication of tax evasion which is good, tax evasion is not to be tolerated. The OECD Council approved The Common Reporting Standard (CRS) on the 15th July 2014. Each jurisdiction which signs up is committed to obtain information from their financial institutions and automatically exchange that information with other jurisdictions on an annual basis.

Guidance on what information is to be collected, which financial institutions are required to report, the different types of accounts and the information of the taxpayers as well as the due diligence procedures to be followed were first published in July 2014. However, concerns were soon expressed as to whether the information collected and exchanged would be secure in the hands of some of the ‘home’ countries of the beneficial owners such as Brazil.

While it is expected that most countries will sign up to CRS via a multilateral convention, some jurisdictions such as Hong Kong have adopted a ‘bi lateral’ approach, which means it will sign up only one country at a time and will not sign up to some of the less developed and secure jurisdictions.

The OECD is keen to stress that each country must meet certain standards to safeguard the information and if these standards are not met, other countries need not exchange the information collected with them. This let out clause is naturally not welcomed by many of the poorer developing countries which see themselves as being denied access to the information collected but then not exchanged. The OECD acknowledge this concern and has tasked the Global Forum to work with the OECD Task Force on Tax and Development in finding a solution.

It is public knowledge that Bernie Ecclestone is a billionaire and he would have been well advised to insure against the risk of his mother in law’s kidnap. However, as from 2017, the risk of kidnap of anyone who has an offshore bank account is likely to increase dramatically. The only way for these people to sleep soundly at night is to either move their account onshore, or to a country which has not signed a bilateral agreement with their home country or to countries which will not exchange the information collected until their systems are secure from hacking by criminals. Even if secure from hacking anyone with monies offshore should be concerned that their information could be sold by corrupt employees of these government institutions. It happened in Liechtenstein and could happen anywhere.

Privacy planning is, for UHNW families with investments world-wide, not a nice to have, but a must have. As from 2017, the confidentiality of financial information wherever it is, can no longer be guaranteed, unless it is in a country which does not collect or exchange information.

I welcome your comments and if you would like to know about privacy planning, estate planning, family governance, dispute resolution or matrimonial concerns contact svetlana@garnhamfos.com or call 020 3740 7423.

Are we going to be queuing for an EU passport?

Last week I was invited to Cyprus to visit some clients and catch up with some professionals on the island.

One of my clients, who I will call Ivan, owns a substantial Russian company which specialises in precious stones. He has long taken advantage of the beneficial tax treaty between Russia and Cyprus to extract profits from Russia and then to send them on to the BVI.

Sadly for him both Russia and the BVI were closing in on him and he was concerned. As from January this year, Russia expects every company owned by a Cyprus company to have an office in Cyprus. Ivan has therefore taken space in Limassol, an attractive city on the sea and has mapped out a schedule of visits to coincide with board meeting and annual reports. His company had an apartment in Larnaca, but it was too small for his family.

He was also concerned about the sudden change of direction in the BVI. As a British dependent territory the BVI has to keep a register of wealth owners, their interests and details under the common reporting standard (CRS) which it is under pressure from Britain to make available to the public. It would be bad enough to know that his interests in the BVI would be known to Russia, but for it to be made public was a real worry for him.

Ivan invited me to his office to discuss his options. He confided in me that he had recently remarried and had two daughters under five, but was not seeing them as much as he would like. He was also fearful for their safety. A friend of his who I will call Sasha, had his bank account in Liechtenstein hacked and as a result he and his family were blackmailed; the blackmailer knew all his account details, the names of his family and where his daughters went to school. It was unacceptable to him that his daughters could be at risk from crooks for whom the CRS is a license to print money.

We explored a number of options some of which were very attractive. He was eager to pursue the transfer immediately so that he could sleep at night. 

We then turned to his desire of wanting to spend more time in Cyprus. I suggested that he buy a really nice holiday home in the luxury resort of Paphos which was only 40 minutes from Limassol by car. He could then bring his family with him when he needed to work for the holding company, and spend with them some quality time together.

Cyprus is a destination of choice for 2.5 million tourists every year, who come to enjoy its clear blue waters, ideal climate and sandy beaches. Ivan and I visited some fabulous new residential homes on the seafront which were designed for luxury family life. Ivan was clearly excited.

I pointed out that with a quality home came the added advantage of an EU passport.

This was clearly of interest. As a frequent flyer to European destinations, Ivan was fed up with queuing for immigration and had frequently been caught short by an out of date visa. Cyprus is not only a member of the EU where there is freedom of movement, but has an extensive list of countries which entitle the passport holders visa free travel. Passports would also be available for his wife and two daughters.

The other advantage was that if ever he felt it necessary to leave Russia in a hurry, he had a safe place to which he could retreat where his daughters could enjoy quality education and health care.

As a Citizen of Europe he and his family would also be entitled to a European Health Insurance Card which provides insurance for emergency medical treatment insurance when visiting other participating countries. The look on Ivan’s face said it all, it was just too good to be true.

I said that I could make all the necessary arrangements for him; relocate his wealth and trust from the BVI, introduce him to people for priority property purchases and obtain for him and his family Cyprus passports.

Last week was the first time I had been to Cyprus, but what struck me, in particular, were the people. They were keen to innovate for the benefit of their clients, eager to work with a sense of urgency and exuded a pride in their ability to provide a quality service.

Cyprus was the perfect location for Ivan and his family, and I suspect it could be the perfect location for many others as the world becomes an ever more hostile place for the UHNW families to live.

If you would like to book a meeting with Caroline or one of her colleagues, for estate planning, privacy planning, dispute resolution, matrimonial concerns, offshore trust review or investment strategy, please contact svetlana@garnhamfos.com or call 020 3740 7423.

We need to rethink Privacy Planning

Twenty years ago I was approached by a professional trustee who I will call Jack, who had taken on the office of Protector of a Trust which owned a very substantial trading company. ‘I am nervous,’ he said. ‘If there is a claim against the company or the trust I could get dragged in personally. I have no funds at my disposal with which to defend any claim other than my own personal finances and have only limited information or right to information. A claim could wipe me out!’

I looked into the situation for him and wrote a report. He was in deed in a precarious position. He had a fiduciary duty towards the beneficiaries of the trust, which meant he had to act in their best interests even if it meant being proactive without being paid for his services. At the same time his hands were tied; he had no funds to take a legal opinion and no legal right to access information even if he did have the funds.

My report for Jack was put to the settlor who will I will call Joseph, who was luckily alive and well disposed towards Jack. He had not realised that Jack was, as the ‘Protector’ of his trust in such a vulnerable position to carry out his obligations in protecting his trust.

Joseph instructed me to see what solution we could find. He wanted Jack to remain in a decision making role, wanted him to have access to resources of information and funds, but did not want him to be exposed personally.

Between us we came up with the solution of setting up a private trustee company which was at that time, to my knowledge, the first. Jack was appointed a director, and as such had limited liability, had access to funds should he need to use them to fulfil his fiduciary duties, and access to information so that he could do his job properly. The professional trustees were then appointed under a contract of services to continue doing their job in administering the trust, but were relieved of their obligation to take fiduciary decisions which were now assigned to Jack and his fellow directors.

There are many trusts still being administered successfully by professional trustees to which powers, such as the removal and replacement of trustees have been reserved to a Protector. In some cases, the powers reserved are limited and in others they are extensive. Some trusts such as those governed by the International Trust Law of Cyprus, can reserve a power to a Protector which can determine when and to whom distributions are to be made without invalidating the trust. Whether the powers are limited or extensive, these powers give the Protector ‘significant control’.

Under the common reporting standard due to come into force next year tax relevant information will automatically be exchanged between jurisdictions and it will include the identity of the Protector and trust of which he holds office.

The definition of ‘beneficial owner has been extended in the CRS to include PSC’s; ‘persons exercising significant control’ as follows: 'Beneficial owner refers to the natural person who ultimately owns or controls a customer or the natural person on whose behalf a transaction is being conducted. It also so includes those persons who exercise ultimate effective control over a legal person or arrangement.’

The concern for every Protector is what will the tax authorities do, as and when they get hold of their name and the trust of which they are a Protector? Will they start an investigation under the Tax Information Exchange Agreement between the two countries?

The Protector, as I have said before, is in an invidious position; he or she does not have the resources to comply with a full investigation and neither will he or she have the necessary information, even if they were funded to comply.

The role of the Protector is to give the settlor some control over his assets, should the trustees begin to act in a manner which was not in line with his wishes. In most cases however the role of the Protector in practice is removed from the activities of the trust and so it may come as a real shock when the tax authorities start to investigate.

My advice to anyone who is concerned about their involvement with an offshore trust, whether as a Protector, settlor, beneficiary, trustee or director of a Private Trustee company is to get an independent review of the structure not only to protect the Protector, but also to ensure that the family knows who is reporting what and if necessary make changes.

Privacy Planning has nothing to do with the evasion of tax or any other illegal activity. For example, I will not take on any client if I have reason to believe they want privacy to evade tax. However, many wish to protect their family from an unwanted and expensive investigation and to do so they want to know what changes they need to make this year.

If you would like to book an appointment to see Caroline or any one of her team on succession, estate planning, offshore trust review, dispute resolution, matrimonial concerns, or investment strategies, please contact svetlana@garnhamfos.com or call 020 3740 7423.

Is privacy dead?

This morning I asked my daughter, aged 20, whether she would like the details of her bank account made public. She was indignant – it was her private bank account! What she earns and how she spends it are not the business of anyone else in her opinion.

However, the global commitment to transparency and stamping out tax evasion would appear to justify having one rule for the rich and another for the less well off. And before you say, but is only the rich who have money offshore take a little time to consider where and how your pension is invested and yet the automatic exchange of information does not apply to pensions which are administered and managed offshore so as to enable them to accumulate tax free.

For many UHNW families privacy is very important, and I can already see more and more of them making arrangements to protect it.

In the US ,FATCA, the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act contained in Sections 1471 to 1474 of the US Internal Revenue Code, was adopted on 17 January 2013 and effective as of 28 January 2013.

The purpose of this legislation was to prevent US persons from using foreign accounts and foreign entities to evade US tax on their assets deposited abroad. US taxpayers; banks, brokers, and investment management companies are obliged to withhold 30% of payments to foreign entities unless those foreign entities are either exempt or they have an agreement with the IRS to disclose all account details of US persons to the IRS. The withholding requirement became operative on 1st July 2014.

The OECD studied FATCA and then took it one step further generally known as the Common Reporting Standard (CRS). This is heavily based on the Intergovernmental Agreements introduced by the US under FATCA but is two way; not one way. The details of these proposals were first published in February 2014, with more details in July 2014.

To date all 34 OECD countries support it and more than 90 countries are committed to it, including all members of the EU, the BRIC countries and most major global economies such as Japan, Australia Canada and Switzerland. (Although the UK has voted to leave the EU, given the prominent role it played in shaping the CRS, I doubt whether it will not remain committed to it).

The way CRS works is that each country signs a bi-lateral agreement with every other country to agree to the automatic exchange of information dealing with tax matters. The only fig leaf offered to protect the privacy and confidentiality of the residents of any one country is that if it is concerned as to the confidentiality of data exchange with another country, it can decline to enter into an agreement with that other country.

But like so many proposals the ‘devil (or opportunity) is in the detail’. The countries which are committed to CRS all have different laws and rules. In some countries a company is resident in the country from which it is controlled, in others it is where it is registered and in others it is from where it is effectively managed. This means that if a company is owned by Mr Jones who is a resident in country X, is registered in country A, controlled from country B, and has its effective management in country C, information about the profits to which Mr Jones is entitled could be automatically exchanged with country X from three different countries; A,B and C depending on their bi-lateral agreements. This could mean triplication of information about the same profits to which Mr Jones is entitled.

Then of course what happens if you put a US entity in the mix. If a US resident Mr Wilson, has an account held by a bank in Switzerland, under FATCA the bank has to disclose Mr Wilson’s account details to the IRS but what about the other way around? A Swiss resident has a company in Delaware from which he receives dividends, which he does not declare to the Swiss tax authorities. There is no obligation on the company administrators in Delaware to disclose this information to the Swiss tax authorities. The Intergovernmental Agreement Switzerland has with the US is for a one-way traffic of data exchange.

For many UHNW families, who value their privacy whether they fear for the safety of family members, theft or adverse publicity, the fact that the US engages in only one-way exchange is attracting interest and ‘Privacy Planning’ is already on the minds of many UHNW families. However, exploiting the difference between the US and the rest of the world is not the only area attracting interest.

If country A and country B agree to exchange information with regard only to companies registered in their jurisdiction, but country B and C agree to exchange information only with companies controlled from their jurisdiction it may be possible to register a company in jurisdiction C, but control it from country B for a resident of country A. In this case neither country will be required to exchange information about this company to country A. This may be a facile example, but already fears and opportunities are being discussed across the globe as UHNW families become aware of the dangers of automatic exchange of information.

What are your views on ‘Privacy Planning’?

If you would like to book an appointment with Caroline or with anyone of her colleagues for succession, estate planning, privacy planning, offshore trust structuring, dispute resolution, matrimonial, or any other issue, please contact svetlana@garnhamfos.com or call 020 3740 7423.

Brexit - what the rich could expect?

What does Brexit mean for UHNWIs in Britain? Who knows – it very much depends on who will be our next leader and what his or her vision of Britain outside the EU will be. There is a global need for what we can offer, but we need someone with the guts to grasp it.

Our strengths on the world stage are that the UK is the world’s leading financial centre and undisputed centre for UHNWIs. The country needs now unashamedly to position itself as the world’s leading financial centre - offshore.

Our weakness is that the UK now has a politically unacceptable gap between the country’s very rich and our working middle class; doctors, teachers, accountants and architects. George Osborne has been set upon addressing this divide by pulling the rich down with swingeing taxes and eye popping fees. He has hiked stamp duty land tax up to 15%. Three years ago the boroughs of Westminster, and Kensington and Chelsea accounted for more revenue from stamp duty land tax than Scotland, Northern Ireland, Wales and northern England put together, this has now fallen by half.

In addition, he has introduced an annual tax on enveloped dwellings and extended inheritance tax on all UK homes. The result is stagnation of the high end property market to the detriment of all businesses which cater for this market; architects, builders, interior designers, plumbers and estate agents. 

Rather than making the rich pay their fair share of tax, the UHNWIs are confused and bewildered. Are they still welcome in this country?  The new taxes introduced over the last few years have sent out the wrong message. What we need is for the rich to live and invest in the UK, not to drive them away and to penalize them when they bring their wealth into the country.

However, we do not have the luxury of time.

The world needs to know that we are serious about wanting to attract business into the UK. If we don’t we will be negotiating from a position of weakness; trading agreements, treaty concessions or the terms on which we exit the EU.

As a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Taxation and leading private client lawyer, a new leader could do this very simply with a few tweaks to our tax legislation

·      lower the rate of stamp duty land tax to 4% (the same as for commercial properties) for all residential properties other than properties owned by non UK residents. This will send a clear message that we want to encourage the wealthy to buy in our country provided they live here and pay taxes as UK residents

·      provide an exemption for every non dom who lives in this country and brings wealth into the country to be managed in the UK, or invested in the UK. I cannot see any logic in attracting the rich into our country, and then to stop them bringing in their wealth for us to manage and invest

·      tax all remittances to the UK to income tax regardless of the source of funds, which will make the remittance basis of taxation much fairer and simpler to operate

·      remove the fee for the remittance basis of taxation

·      encourage all non doms with trusts offshore to bring them onshore with full income tax and capital gains tax exemptions and to extend the inheritance tax exemption to UK situs investments. The UK is the founder of the trust, but has taxed trusts so savagely in recent years that they are no longer created in this country. This would provide a much needed boost to our tax and trust industry; lawyers, barristers and dispute resolution experts

·      lower the rate of VAT for non-luxury goods and services.

Taxing the rich at unacceptably high rates is not good for the country.  With the vote to leave the EU and resignation of Cameron, we now have the opportunity to play to our strengths. In so doing we can once again become Great Britain; rather than Little England.

If you are in agreement with my views, please share this with your MP and in particular to all candidates who have put themselves forward to succeed Cameron.

Caroline has written two books ‘When you are Super Rich who can you Trust’ and ‘How to win business from Private Clients’.

If you would like to book an appointment to see Caroline for estate planning, offshore trust review or succession, or any one of her colleagues for dispute resolution, family issues or investment strategy, or buy a book please contact svetlana@garnhamfos.com or call 020 37407423.