The US government has revealed the list of 49 countries considered as having a valid Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) inter-governmental agreement in force.
The list is split in two, with 27 nations already inking their agreements, while the rest are finalising their FATCA treaties but are far enough along the line to be considered as complying with the law.
Every nation on the list will be treated as FATCA compliant until December 31, 2014, but the countries who have indicated they are compliant but have yet to sign the treaty will lose this protection unless they sign by the end of the year.
The list of FATCA compliant nations is expected to lengthen as other countries opt-in to the tax information swapping network.
“With 49 countries treated as having inter-governmental agreements in place and more countries ready to declare they will play a part in FATCA, we hope that many foreign financial institutions can see what they have to do to comply,” said the US Treasury deputy assistant secretary for international tax affairs Robert Stack.
Registration deadline delayed
The US Treasury and Internal Revenue Service (IRS) have also extended the registration deadline for foreign financial entities by 10 days until May 5, 2014.
FATCA is aimed at US taxpayers with more than $50,000 of undeclared earnings from offshore bank accounts and investments.
The rules require foreign financial institutions to report the details of any accounts controlled by US taxpayers either through their own tax authority if their country has an inter-government agreement or directly if not.
Foreign financial institutions that fail to comply with FATCA face a 30% withholding tax levied on their US transactions.
The IRS expects at least 750,000 foreign financial institutions to register online by the May 25 deadline.
FATCA compliance starts from July 1, 2014.
Under most of the inter-government agreements, the IRS will provide financial information from US financial institutions about foreign taxpayers to countries with FATCA pacts.
FATCA jurisdiction list
The nations who have signed an inter-government agreement are:
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Bermuda
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Canada
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Cayman Islands
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Chile
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Costa Rica
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Denmark
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Finland
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France
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Germany
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Guernsey
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Hungary
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Honduras
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Ireland
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Isle of Man
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Italy
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Japan
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Jersey
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Luxembourg
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Malta
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Mauritius
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Mexico
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Netherlands
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Norway
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Spain
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Switzerland
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United Kingdom
Those considered as FATCA compliant are:
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Australia
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Austria
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Bahamas
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Belgium
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Brazil
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British Virgin Islands
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Croatia
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Czech Republic
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Estonia
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Gibraltar
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Jamaica
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Kosovo
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Latvia
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Liechtenstein
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Lithuania
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New Zealand
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Poland
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Portugal
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Qatar
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Romania
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Slovenia
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South Africa
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South Korea
