FATCA registration: Procedures for Asian banks
With FATCA coming into effect soon, the IRS has announced procedural details for banks to become registered “Foreign Financial Institutions”. July 02, 2012 | David MillarThe Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) will affect every deposit or investment-taking bank, insurance company and investment fund in Asia. The impact of the act will be far-reaching as, even if organisations do not deal with American citizens or companies, most have business dealings with other financial institutions that do so. FATCA will require banks to track their US taxpayer-clients and send their account details to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). Even if financial institutions decided to shed their existing US clients, they must still register to become a foreign financial institution (FFI) and certify that proper exclusion processes are being implemented. Last week, the IRS released a new procedure to be implemented whereby FFIs must be registered to become “participating FFIs” under FATCA regulations. To be fair, the IRS has attempted to make the registration as simple and straightforward as possible by creating an online, automated system that allows internet registration and provides e-mail alerts for participating FFIs. The process involves three steps: entering the agreement, assigning the responsible person at the FFI, and how this person signs the agreement. Entering the agreement - FFIs will register and enter into an agreement through an online registration system. - A certification will be used if registering as a Deemed-Compliant FFI, i.e. a participating FFI that has been approved by the IRS. This FATCA registration will be an FFI user-maintained account held under IRS’ systems and will be edited or modified by the user. Organisational responsibility - Each FFI must select one FATCA Responsibility Officer (RO) who will be identified in the FATCA registration system. - In a typical case, the RO will be the individual who will sign the FFI agreement. - The RO may select Points of Contact (POCs) to help complete all aspe... Please login to read the complete article. If you already have an account, you can login now or subscribe/register.
Categories: Regulation, Risk and Regulationriskregulation,Risk and Regulation, Regulation,Risk and Regulation, Keywords:FATCA, FFI, IRS, Asia FATCA, FFI, IRS, Asia
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