These days it is getting REALLY dicey to attempt any offshore solutions (IF your goal is to avoid paying taxes) There are other reasons to keep money outside the US, but 99% of folks do it for the sole purpose of avoiding US Tax. My VERY DIRECT personal expeience from having it run on and off shore....
Unless what you are doing to generate the $ is highly illegal (in which case take you chances offshore), I felt better off reporting it and not having to look over your shoulder. Governments are cooperating with each other more and more every day. The days of the swiss banks telling the DOJ to go fuck themselves are long gone
And unless you have family or a friend you trust with all your money, you have to get involed with hiring nominee shareholders. We did it and it kept me awake at night knowing it could all be gone in a heartbeat.
I have friends who have lost millions (guys in the adult businees who we all know) because the banks just decided one day that "what they were doing required further investigation" and basicly held the cash. They had to fly over , meet with the bank and cut a deal. The deal was they would stop asking the bank for the money and pursuing it and in return the bank would give them 50% of what was in the account. Shakedown, pure and simple.
I dont like cutting big checks at the end of the year to the government, but at the end of the day I know what I have in the bank is mine...safe and secure. I can sleep knowing what Ive built for my family wont dissapear on the whim of a foreign bank or because someone turned over some documents after a little presure from US intrests.
sorry for the ramble, just my experience
