Commerzbank, Germany’s second largest bank, has agreed to pay the United States Government and New York State $1.45 billion for its role in money laundering schemes.

This article details an order issued by a District Court called writ of ne exeat republica. To convince a judge to issue this writ, the IRS must essentially prove that a taxpayer has transferred assets into a foreign jurisdiction for the purpose of avoiding the payment of tax owed to the IRS.

The articles details the most public figure to renounce U.S. Citizenship to date. The combination of the Department of Justice/IRS offshore initiative and FATCA has spurned a lot of “Accidential-Americans,” dual-citizens and expats to renounce their citizenship.

FATCA has created a storm of controversy over the last year. Many predicted that foreign jurisdictions would not cooperate, but the opposite has been true. With the first exchange deadline approaching (March 31st, 2015), FATCA will begin to make an impact on those Americans with undisclosed offshore accounts, further closing the loop on Offshore Tax Evasion.

Yesterday, March 31, 2015, it was announced that BSI SA of Lugano signed the DOJ Non-Prosecution Agreement (NPA). Here is a summary:

This article is meant to provide some transparency to the FATCA reporting (Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act) process through clarifying how the forms interrelate to the processes on the front end and IRS enforcement on the back end.

If a taxpayer ever receives an email designated from the IRS, they should immediately contact the IRS generally or the Treasury Inspector General to determine the validity.

With tax season coming up for American expats and other U.S. tax persons, we’d like to highlight a few things regarding preparing your returns.

Most U.S. citizens or green card holders who have offshore banking accounts are by now aware of the potential financial and even criminal exposure they may face with non-disclosure.