What in the world is FATCA?
FATCA (Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act) is a new piece of US legislation that requires foreign (i.e. anything outside of the US) financial institution to provide information to the US government about the bank account holdings of any “US persons” (citizens or residents of the US).
They have done this as a way to find US persons who are not reporting their foreign holdings as they are supposed to. Canada has signed an inter-governmental agreement with the US such that it will actually be the Canada Revenue Agency that collects this info from the Canadian banks and gives it to the US government (so we’re paying for it!).
The details of this are complex but suffice to say that if you are a “US person”, you should make sure you know what the deal is. You can check this link to a related Q&A on our website. Contact your tax and financial advisors for more information as it relates to you.
Thanks to Richard Wilson, Partner, for this info link.
FATCA: ENHANCED FINANCIAL ACCOUNT INFORMATION REPORTING (PDF)