New Jersey Estate Planning, Probate, Tax & Elder Law Center

Your Information source for wills, trusts, estate tax minimization, powers of attorney, living wills, health care directives, special needs trusts, asset protection, charitable giving, guardianship, succession planning, retirement and estate administration.

Analysis of the new 2012 Offshore Voluntary Disclosure Program (OVDP)

Yesterday the Internal Revenue Service opened its Offshore Voluntary Disclosure Program (OVDP) to encourage more taxpayers with assets in undeclared foreign bank accounts to come forward.  While the OVDP was not expected by most tax lawyers and professionals, it may be welcomed by many of our clients who missed the recently closed 2011 OVDI program. [...]

IRS Announces New 2012 Offshore Voluntary Disclosure Program (OVDP)

The Internal Revenue Service today reopened the offshore voluntary disclosure program to help people hiding offshore accounts get current with their taxes. The IRS reopened the Offshore Voluntary Disclosure Program (OVDP) following continued strong interest from taxpayers and tax practitioners after the closure of the 2011 and 2009 programs. The third offshore program comes as [...]

Another Bank Discloses Accountholders: Credit Suisse to Turn Over U.S. Account Data

Earlier this month Credit Suisse Group AG, Switzerland’s second-biggest bank, told U.S. clients it is giving confidential client account data to the Swiss tax authorities, who will decide whether to disclose it to the Internal Revenue Service. The U.S. is probing whether Credit Suisse helped Americans evade taxes, and the IRS used a 1996 tax [...]

What if You Missed the OVDI Deadline?

Although the OVDI program has expired, a U.S. taxpayer can still make a voluntary disclosure of foreign accounts pursuant to the IRS’s general voluntary disclosure policy. For over 50 years, the IRS has maintained a voluntary disclosure policy, under which taxpayers can disclose, and rectify, any form of tax noncompliance. To make a voluntary disclosure, [...]

HSBC India Customer New Indictment Uncovers More HSBC Details

A Wisconsin neurosurgeon was re- indicted by a U.S. grand jury on new charges that he failed to declare an HSBC Holdings Plc (HSBA) account in India valued in 2009 at $8.7 million.  Arvind Ahuja was indicted again by a federal grand jury in Milwaukee, where he was initially charged June 28 with concealing accounts [...]

IRS Publicizes and Celebrates OVDI Success

As expected, the United States Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has disclosed that the recently-completed offshore voluntary offshore initiative (OVDI) has pushed the total number of voluntary disclosures up to 30,000 since 2009. The IRS customarily publicizes (and celebrates) such accomplishments. The 2011 OVDI, which was announced in February this year, followed a previous disclosure initiative [...]

With No More Amnesty Program: Explore the IRS’s Traditional Voluntary Disclosure program

Even though the deadline for the Internal Revenue Service’s 2011 Offshore Voluntary Disclosure Initiative has concluded last week, U.S. taxpayers with undisclosed offshore accounts still have the opportunity to come forward through the IRS’s traditional Voluntary Disclosure program. Like the OVDI, the traditional Voluntary Disclosure program provides taxpayers an opportunity to come forward and potentially [...]

New Extended Deadline for OVDI

Last week, late on Friday afternoon, August 26, 2011, the IRS issued a statement indicating that the due date for filing 2011 Offshore Voluntary Disclosure Initiative (OVDI) requests has been extended until September 9, 2011, due to the potential impact of Hurricane Irene. Prior to this statement, the deadline was set to occur on August [...]

OVDI Deadline Extended to September 9, 2011

While our law firm is expeditiously filing OVDI applications and extensions for new OVDI applications, the IRS has extended the OVDI deadline to September 9, 2011 because of the potential impact of Hurricane Irene on taxpayers. The IRS’ announcement was published only three hours ago. The IRS had previously given taxpayers until August 31 to [...]