The “Dirty Secret” of U.S. FATCA IGAs
The world is starting to wake up to better understand how the U.S. Treasury negotiated so-called “bilateral” FATCA Intergovernmental Agreements (“IGAs”) with some 113 countries around the world. 
The list of all countries can be found here at the Treasury website – Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA)
Not all of these countries have actually signed the IGAs. Many of them have what the U.S. Treasury calls an “agreement in substance.”
How does this impact USCs and LPRs residing outside the U.S.? Many ways.
First, extensive information is being collected by foreign financial institutions (FFIs – non-U.S. financial institutions) throughout the world to identify “U.S. Persons” and “Substantial U.S. Owners.” The IGAs use the term “Specified U.S. Person” with respect to what are defined as “U.S. Reportable Accounts.” See as an example, the Treasury FATCA IGA with Colombia, which is largely identical in form to almost all other IGAs.
Second, many FFIs have adopted a policy to no longer accept or retain U.S. accounts, due to the cost of compliance associated with U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents. Also, many FFIs simply want to avoid the risk of being penalized heavily by the U.S. federal 
government for having U.S. taxpayers and being charged with some type of wrongdoing; namely aiding and abetting U.S. taxpayers to evade U.S. tax obligations. See, Jack Townsend’s thoughtful website Federal Tax Crimes that reviews in detail the various cases with foreign banks, with a particular focus on Swiss banks, U.S. DOJ Program for Swiss Banks .
Now to the “dirty little secret” of FATCA IGAs. They are not bilateral in the sense that U.S. banks do not need to provide the same detailed information on their non-U.S. clients (e.g., UK, French, Canadian, Mexican, Chinese, Dutch, Spanish, Colombian, Brazilian, residents, etc.) as do FFIs regarding “U.S. accounts.” This is no real secret, since a simple reading of the FATCA IGAs will get you to this conclusion by simply understanding the difference between what is defined as a “U.S. Reportable Account” (which is extraordinarily broad) compared to “Country X Reportable Account.” The latter definition, e.g., a Colombian Reportable Account, only obligates U.S. banks to send information of individual residents on U.S. source income under chapter 3 and certain accounts of Colombian entities. 
Hence, all non-U.S. source income to a Colombia resident individual is not subject to reporting by the U.S. financial institution. She could have a portfolio of US$150M in non-U.S. mutual funds, ADRs traded on the NYSE and have no reporting of all of her income going back to the Colombian government. Also, stock sales of U.S. corporations (e.g., Apple, Ford or Microsoft) is not treated as “U.S. source income” defined under chapter 3. Plus, a Colombian resident who has an offshore corporation (e.g., a BVI company) that owns the investments, NO reporting is required of the U.S. financial institution; even if the entire US$150M portfolio were invested in U.S. stocks, U.S. treasuries, and other American made financial investments.
Contrast that with what is defined as a “U.S. Reportable Account” that would include a U.S. Person that is a “Controlling Person” of a “Non-U.S. Entity.” Take the same example in reverse; a Colombian bank must identify all of its clients with Non-U.S. Entities (undertake an expensive due diligence process) to then identify whether such entities (e.g., a BVI company) has a “Specified U.S. Person”. Plus, it does not matter if the income is from Colombian sources or non-Colombian sources. Income is income and must be reported by the FFI.
Accordingly, Banks around the world in at least 113 countries (e.g., UK, French, Mexican, Chinese, Dutch, Spanish, Colombian, Brazilian, Cayman, Singapore, Guatemala, Hong Kong, etc.) are required to drill down and collect detailed information on beneficial owners of basically all companies, trusts and other legal entities. This work is required, so as to identify who are “U.S. persons” to identify “substantial U.S. owners” as that term is defined in the FATCA regulations. The IGAs call these essentially “U.S. Reportable Accounts.” In the case of FFIs, U.S. taxpayers cannot hide behind offshore opaque legal entities (e.g., which would generally be illegal for USCs to form and hold assets in a foreign corporation and not report the assets, activities and earnings of the foreign corporation, which would generally be a CFC or possibly a PFIC). 
See prior post: March 30, 2015, The Problem with PFICs! “Avoid PFICs Like the Plague”
The FATCA IGAs, require these FFIs to provide extensive information on all income on these “U.S. Reportable Account” to the IRS, either directly or indirectly through their own governments.
In contrast, individuals resident in any foreign country (e.g., UK, French, Mexican, Chinese, Dutch, Spanish, Colombian, Brazilian, Belgium, Guatemala, Luxembourg, etc.) can generally hold their ownership interests of U.S. investment assets in U.S. banks and financial institutions through opaque legal structures and hide behind the entity without worrying that a U.S. financial institution has any duty to identify and disclose who are the beneficial owners to the tax authorities of those residents. See Colombian individual scenario above with a BVI company.
- Why did the Treasury purposefully create this limited reporting obligations for U.S. financial institutions while creating extensive and detailed reporting obligations for FFIs?
- Why are U.S. financial institutions not required under FATCA IGAs to identify the beneficial owners of opaque legal structures to report the income and gains to foreign tax authorities?
- Why are U.S. financial institutions not required under FATCA IGAs to identify the and report non-U.S. source income in their U.S. accounts?
- Why has the U.S. refused to participate in the OECD common reporting standards?
- Why did the U.S. federal government wait until just this month of May 2016, to say it will start increasing the ” . . . transparency [of] the “beneficial ownership” of companies formed in the United States by requiring that companies know and report their true owners . . . “?
- Why is the White House just now saying it is going to be “Closing a Loophole that Enables Foreigners to Hide Behind Anonymous Entities Formed in the United States” when from inception, starting in 2012 all of the FATCA IGAs (which were drafted and negotiated exclusively by the U.S. Treasury) have always allowed foreigners with accounts and investments in the U.S. to hide behind anonymous entities?