Elias Neocleous, head of our corporate and commercial department, was one of the main speakers at the sixth annual conference on "Transparency and New Fiscal Strategies for Russia and CIS clients " held in Zurich on 14 and 15 March. The event was organised by Academy & Finance SA, one of the leaders in the organisation of conferences and seminars in the field of private wealth management. The conference featured an impressive range of leading experts in their respective fields, and was attended by more than 100 delegates.
Speakers from leading international law and accounting firms analysed and compared the respective challenges and opportunities offered by Switzerland, the United Kingdom, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and Cyprus as a jurisdiction in relation to investments from or into Russia in the context of topical issues such as:
- CFC rules, tax residency of companies, substance, and the approach taken by the Russian tax authorities;
- The latest developments in key jurisdictions for Russian clients, including Cyprus, the UK, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and Liechtenstein.
- Trusts and asset protection for Russian clients
- The proposed changes to the UK non-domiciled regime and their likely impact on Russian clients
As well as having the distinction of chairing the first part of the conference on the reforms in critical jurisdictions for Russian clients, Elias also gave presentations on the following topics:-
- CFC rules: What are the trends? How are the tax authorities enforcing CFC rules?
- Russian tax administration and the issue of lack of substance of companies: what are the usual weaknesses and how to strengthen your companies?
- Cyprus: the recent and upcoming reforms
- A case study for a Russian family
These covered the latest developments in Cyprus including important new incentives such as the introduction of the Cyprus "non-dom" regime, the new notional interest deduction and the extension of the scope of existing tax advantages, and highlighted the low effective tax rate for high-earning individuals. With proper implementation, these new developments offer very attractive opportunities for international tax planning.
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