Choosing Where to Offshore Your Savings and Investments

When you expatriate, i.e., when you move abroad and drop your British residency status, you suddenly become more aware of your global options when it comes to the banking of, saving and investing of your hard earned cash. 

When you live onshore in the UK, the thought of ‘offshore’ seems somehow elusive and even perhaps ‘naughty,’ but as soon as you move abroad you soon realise that actually, as an expat you can really benefit from investing your funds somewhere other than the new nation you’re living in.

It doesn’t necessarily pay to bring all of your wealth onshore with you to your new nation of residence because basically, you don’t have to!  So why introduce the local taxman to all of your wealth.  But when it comes to choosing where to offshore your savings and investments, how do you make the choice?

Getting the Right Advice

The very first thing we need to point out that everyone’s circumstances are completely unique, therefore what’s right for one person may not be right for the next.  Your situation will be influenced by a myriad of factors including where you are resident, where you are domiciled, your marital status and even where you perhaps intend to retire.  So you have to take personalised advice from a professional expert when choosing how and where to invest, secure and grow your wealth.

To that end you are advised to speak to an expatriate financial adviser – i.e., one who is not limited geographically to either advising you based on your situation if you were a local in your new nation, or when you were a local ‘back home.’  When it comes to finding an adviser you have to have someone on board who has as global an outlook as you do, and who understands the offshore marketplace and how you can utilise it.

Choosing an Offshore Jurisdiction for Savings and Investments

An adviser will likely make suggestions to you about how you can build a profitable investment portfolio, where best to squirrel away your savings and even perhaps which banking institutions are offering expatriates the best bank accounts at the moment, but in order for you to then choose the right path for yourself from the options you are presented with, part of your decision making has to be based on the offshore centres the saving, investment or banking solutions are based in.

The reason why it is essential that you choose the right jurisdiction is because we are talking about the safety of your own wealth, so therefore it is unlikely that you will want to take unnecessary risks with it.  This means that you have to ensure that any financial institution recommended to you is located in a favourable offshore centre.

Here are the six main factors that you need to take into consideration when choosing where to offshore your savings and investments: -

1) The political and perhaps even more importantly, the economic stability of the offshore centre.

2) The legislation in place for the protection of your wealth and also your privacy.  Bear in mind that this is a fine line these days as over secretive jurisdictions are frowned upon by the likes of the OECD, with G20 leaders even suggestion sanctions be imposed against non-compliant nations.

3) The level of professional infrastructure in place – i.e., whether the centre in question is well equipped and developed and experienced in terms of the solution you intend establishing for example.

4) The quality of the physical and communications infrastructure in place – e.g., will you be able to access account data via the internet or telephone.

5) The physical geographic location of the jurisdiction – it needs to be accessible to you no matter where in the world you are going to be moving to or living, what’s more, because of directives such as the European Savings Tax Directive, it needs to be a location that you are best advised to commit to with your wealth.

6) Finally, and perhaps most importantly of all, you need to look at the security in place in the jurisdiction to protect you and your assets.  Is there an investor compensation scheme in place if banks or finance houses fail for example?

All of these criteria can be discussed with your financial adviser when you are thinking about where to save and invest your hard earned wealth. 

The best advisers tend to favour the most reputable offshore havens simply because they are working to ensure your long term financial security and development, so just as it is in your best interests to place your wealth in a secure location, so it is in their best interests to direct you to consider these locations.

Making the Most of Your Expat Status

If you’re about to move abroad then you are in the best position possible to get your finances right from the very start, you can ensure you never bring onshore more wealth than you need to, you can make sure you get plans and solutions in place for the management of your wealth from the outset, and what’s more, you can have the longest period of time possible to make the very most of the much more interesting and exciting savings and investment solutions available to you as an expatriate.

If you’ve already moved abroad then the good news is, it is never too late to start making the most of your offshore status!  So speak to an adviser as soon as possible, and start examining your financial situation more closely so that you can see where you can make more of your wealth, and how you can secure your financial future today.