American citizens who live outside the United States are increasingly considering renouncing their US citizenship as Washington prepares to roll out FATCA, said the chief executive of a financial advisory firm.
Nigel Green, chief executive of the deVere Group, has said that over the last six months, the advisory firm had received a 22 percent increase in the number of enquiries from American expatriates around the world who are considering switching their homeland citizenship to that of their adopted countries.
“The majority of these US expats are being prompted to consider this due to the complexity of the reporting process to the IRS, plus the threats of heavy penalties, including for previous, inadvertent non-compliance.
“This sense of anxiety is compounded by the fact that a growing number of Americans are being left stranded by their foreign financial institutions as all banks and wealth management firms will also have to declare the assets of their American clients, and this process is perceived as too costly and burdensome, meaning many are refusing to deal with US citizens.”
In addition, he adds, some Americans are being turned down by foreign firms for jobs in which will require signatory authority as those accounts would be subject to FATCA too.
Green concludes: “Renouncing one’s citizenship is, understandably, a hard and often painful decision, so I would urge Americans who may be looking into this to contact an independent financial advisor with experience in expat wealth management. There is a raft of robust, FATCA-compliant options available.”
Just under 1,800 Americans renounced their US citizenship in 2011 – six times more than in 2008.