https://www.sovereignman.com/trends...d478d3c1148b903ad0ce5f069a0f1b2c05df3485765b8 Last week in the Australian state of Queensland, federal police confiscated a whopping 5,465 ounces of silver (worth roughly $106,000) from a man's home. This was part of a larger series of police raids instigated by the Australian Tax Office against individuals suspected of tax evasion. Two obvious lessons come to mind which bear repeating: 1) As we discussed yesterday, only an idiot commits tax fraud or tax evasion. This goes without saying. There are far too many completely legitimate ways to reduce or even eliminate what you owe which means there's absolutely zero reason to take any chances by wilfully breaking the law. I know this doesn't apply to the vast majority of people reading this, but if you are one of the handful of people out there who has been noncompliant with taxes, definitely consider your options to get it fixed. They will find out eventually. It'll be a much better outcome that you step forward and admit a mistake than wait for the inevitable federal agents to kick down your door in the middle of the night. 2) Don't keep the majority of your assets at home I'm sure that at least some of the people who were subject to the Australian Tax Authority's raids probably did commit tax evasion. But there are probably many who didn't people who just happened to end up on the agency's list through some honest misunderstanding. Nevertheless, they still had federal police raiding their homes, confiscating anything that looked valuable, including cash and precious metals. This could happen to anyone. Any of us could end up by mistake on the wrong side of some government agency's list. It happens to innocent people every single day. The real downer is that once armed agents seize your property or freeze your bank account, it's up to you to prove your own innocence even though they've deprived you of your financial resources to do so. You don't ever want to find yourself in this position. And merely hoping it will never happen isn't exactly a great insurance policy. Have a backup plan. Yes, it makes a LOT of sense to hold some physical cash and precious metals in a safe at your home or office. These are both great hedges against risks in the banking system and monetary system, neither one of which should be underestimated. Remember what happened in Cyprus back in 2013? The entire banking system went bust, prompting the government to freeze everyone's bank account and lock an entire nation out of its savings. It all happened overnight. Friday afternoon everything was fine. Saturday morning was chaos. Just imagine being frozen out of your life's savings without warning. It must have been debilitating. But anyone who had thought ahead and maintained a small stash of precious metals or physical cash at home was just fine. This is an easy, no-brainer, almost zero-cost strategy to implement. But just remember that any domestic assets, whether a local bank account or even cash held in a safe at your house, are still within the jurisdiction of your home country's government agencies. This means that everything you own is at risk if you happen to be the next innocent person to mistakenly end up on the wrong side of their list. Don't keep too much in the home safe. I'd suggest that 1-2 months of living expenses would go a long way in mitigating those financial, banking, and monetary risks. And don't keep the rest in your local bank account; again, bank accounts are especially easy for domestic authorities to freeze and confiscate. Definitely consider keeping at least some assets in a different jurisdiction overseas where your home government has no direct authority. This could include assets like a savings account at a foreign bank, precious metals held at a secure storage facility overseas, or even cryptocurrency like Bitcoin. Our goal is simple: To help you achieve personal liberty and financial prosperity no matter what happens. Multiple times every week, we help over 100,000 Sovereign Man subscribers who are taking their family's liberty and prosperity into their own hands with our free publication, Notes From The Field. Activate your free subscription today, and get instant access to our exclusive Plan B checklist to assess how prepared you are to handle the next financial crisis from a position of strength.
There was no mix up. Everyone on that list was turned in by their accountants. People thinking keeping money abroad should think about what happens if the foreign jurisdictions goes bad. Ie Ask the foreign depositors in Cyprus which was a tax haven. If you are rich enough to have money in Swiss, all good. Or are you going to keep money in say a Burmuda bank or a PM stored in tinpot country?
Agreed missing. But I think you are missing the point of the article. The Feds can come in and kick your doors down and take all your stuff and you have to prove your innocent. That's a long hard ride to travel and costly too.
Im pretty sure they can... with a warrant they can do anything. when you sign up for sdb there is something about it in the fine print.
They can freeze a sdb which means that you can't open it, and if there is probable cause they can get a warrant to open it. I know this because this sdb became an issue for a friend during his divorce a few years ago.
says not to keep money in domestic bank. suggests keeping money in foreign bank account. easy, keep your cash somewhere where NO ONE knows where it is or would even think to look for it.
Bad advice on my part, unless you can hide the money ie keep it secret from ATO, ATO can freeze your money in Swiss Bnak Account just as easy as any Big 4. Quick check on google verifies they sing like any canary.
Not saying you are but if anyone does play with fire make sure you don't have an accountant who does your tax returns. not telling your accountant who signs off on your tax return is in itself an criminal offence, for anyone reading this, likely the biggest and very likely jail time offence. Think about the above, if you colluded with your accountant, the chances are the accountant will roll on you to save their skin, since you are not the only client, ATO likely deal with the accountant, leaving you in the cold. if you withheld information from your accountant, they won't hesitate dropping you in it. Anyone would if another person was f#%king up with their livelihood. Plus if ATO wins, you have to pay for back taxes, penalty on back taxes, interest on back taxes, plus paying for the silks that are sending you to jail, and yours. Of course we are not talking about under reporting $500 travel allowance here.
Obviously the people who got caught deserved what they got, but I find it a tad ironic that big companies are avoiding tax every way they possibly can, yet the governments too gutless to stand up to them. Guess the little people (even the guilty ones) are far easier to prosecute and dont have the bankroll to fight back via the legal system in most cases.
Only a tiny percentage of big companies break the rules, most just have very good accountant and make all the deductions. They have the tax breaks all medium and most small business can access as well. They just have to comply. The problem comes when rules have unforeseen circumstances that clever people exploit. Plus if i was smart tax lawyer or accountant why would i work for ATO, work for Apple and can ten times more. Having said that Tax departments is one Governement department that should be expanded. The more auditors they have the more they can claw back. Unlike other departments they more they spend the more they collect.
These are the NAB T&C's, have a look at clause 13. https://www.nab.com.au/personal/hel...onditions-for-safe-custody-services#part-a-13 I'm sure the other banks would have the same clause. To put some context on what happened to my friend, he really was doing the dodgy on his taxes (overseas bank accounts, shell companies etc) and when his wife left him it all came out ... so this kind of seizure isn't something that would happen to someone who is doing the right thing.
With the guaranteed superannuation, ongoing perks and free travel that they are entitled to after just a few years in the job, our pollies don't really need to save.
