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Description of International Withholding Tax

Whether you are a private investor or an institutional investor your investments are potentially subject to withholding tax. The vital practical issues surrounding this important tax are explained as well as how it can significantly affect the value of your investments. It will arm investors and corporations with the knowledge to confront their fund managers, financial advisors and custodians with the essential questions to maintain the integrity of their investments. For investment managers, custodians and financial institutions, this will provide a blueprint for best practice and benchmarking in the area, ensuring they can answer to their clients and shareholders, and maintain their competitive advantage. Interest areas: banking, taxation, investment management, hedge funds, wealth management, private banking. Only a fraction of all the recoverable tax deducted on cross border investment income is ever reclaimed. With diminishing investment yields and more competitive markets, investors and financial institutions must know enough and do enough to maximise returns on their own and their client's investments

Title Information

ISBN:

9781843740506

Pages:

252 pages

Format:

Paperback

Product Code:

17010

Publisher:

Euromoney Institutional Investor

Published:

01/10/2003

Edition:

New title Edition

Press and Industry Reviews

"Ross McGill has done a remarkable job of illuminating a topic too little known to many whose responsibility is to know all about it"
- Martin S. Foont, Globe Tax Services Inc.

"Nowhere in the market does all this information come together so concisely, until now"
- Cas Sydorowitz, Director of Global Proxy and M&A Services Group, Computershare Analytics

"A unique publication of relevance across the financial community. It brings together public domain information in a way never seen before and one in which investors will be given another and important dimension to their portfolio management planning"
- From the Foreword by Robert B.Davies Regional Director, Pan Americas, SWIFT

"Withholding tax has for too long been an enigma to investors, not made any more penetrable by it's complexity. This book, for the first time, seeks to throw back the veil on this often forgotten, but vitally important, area...ensures countless institutional investors and practitioners can be aware of the undoubted advantages which this process can yield if tackled correctly"
- Kevin Sims, Managing Director, The Pension Fund Partnership

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Contents of International Withholding Tax

About the author
Acknowledgements
Foreword
Preface

1: Introduction to withholding tax
Who should read this book?
Why this book is important
Why withholding tax is important
What is international withholding tax?
The investor's perspective
Liability and fiduciary duty issues for custodians

2: An overview of withholding tax regimes
Four types of withholding tax regime
Variations and permutations in withholding tax regimes
The intentions of governments
Statutes of limitation
Who should be reclaiming, why and how
Withholding tax regimes
Relief at source (RAS)
Reclaims

3: Contractual tax
Contractual tax from the investor's perspective
Contractual tax from the custodian's perspective

4: Technology
Buying technology
Building technology
Bureau-based solutions
Outsourcing
Different institutions, different solutions

5: Basic reclaim systems
An overview
Specific aspects of the process
Process management and risk
Variations

6: Relief at source and treaty benefit systems
The Depository Trust Company (DTC)

7: The US advanced RAS system
Introduction
A brief history of the regulations, 1979�-97
How RAS works in the United States
IRS intent versus real impact
General issues
Technical issues
The W-8 series of forms
Issue for NQIs and withholding agents
Treasury issues: making deposits
IRS reporting issues
Answers to some frequently asked questions about the US system

8: The Japanese system
Introduction
History
Principles

9: The system in the Irish Republic
Introduction
Types of distributions liable to withholding tax
Types of distributions not liable to withholding tax
Persons exempt from withholding tax
Main participants and their obligations
Qualifying intermediaries (QIs)
Documentation of exemptions
The sub-accounting issue
Special intermediaries (SIs)
Frequently asked questions about the Irish system

10: The future of withholding tax regimes
New treaties and emerging markets
Tax harmonisation across the EU
Relief at source versus reclaim
Towards electronic declarations
Towards straight-through processing (STP)
Changes in treatment (and how they are reported)
Trends in withholding tax rates
Conclusion

11: SWIFT messaging
SWIFT
Messaging for withholding tax

12: Benchmarking
Process efficiency (PE) index
Benchmarks for risk management
RAS efficiency
Power of attorney (PoA) index
Reconciliation and traceability (RT) index
Backlogs (B)
Capacity (C)
Cost per reclaim (CR)
Reclaim rate (N)
Cost benefit (CB)
Threshold index (TH)
Contractual tax index (CTI)
Validity, eligibility and value (VEV) index

Appendix: Sources of information on the web
A subscription-based information and news service
General websites
Tax authorities