JT: You don’t know? Come on. That’s not credible, you’re a business man. You must know.
AB: No. Seriously, I don’t know exactly. Really. Remember that they won’t give me statements unless I go to Zurich. I know roughly how much. Valued in dollars it’s something like $120,000 now. Almost everything is currency change though. I can’t find out unless close it or go to Zurich. Would you spend $2000 to get a statement from your bank? That is a lot of money. I don’t go to Zurich now, except on vacation.
JT: What happened to the business in Eastern Europe?
AB: Shut down. Fall in the dollar killed it finally. We were doing a kind of outsourcing for software. I was sorry to have to close, but it didn’t work anymore.
JT: What do you think about this IRS stuff and the $20 billion hidden assets?
AB: Oh, I am sure some of those guys are there. I’ve seen some of them going in and out of the banks. But do the math. UBS minimums are 35,000 CHF [Swiss Francs]. I got to know one of the bankers there and he told me once that their average balance is about 2 or 3 million. But most of the accounts are under $200,000. So there are a few accounts that are really big, and some may be hiding significant income. But most accounts are like mine, not that much. Most are just people wanting to save money and be able to decide what currency they will hold for the account. Now, I don’t know these things for facts. It’s just what he said and what I’ve seen going in and out of the bank when I’m there. But it makes sense to me.
Do I think there is $20 billion hidden from the IRS? I really don't know. I don't think that those account holders owe nearly as much money as the IRS is saying though. It just doesn't make sense. Most sane people when they put money in Switzerland, put it into some mix of the most stable currencies around, like Yen, Euro, CHF. The dollar isn't a good reserve currency anymore. "Regular Joes" in the United States are getting royally screwed because our banks won't do non-dollar accounts. You have to do this FOREX crap, and it's ridiculous. Every other nation, the banks do accounts in most any currency you want. Change that, and most of the motivation to go to Switzerland goes away. I wouldn't have bothered. But I won't hold my breath for American banks to offer choice of currency denomination accounts.
JT: So what are you going to do now?
AB: I don’t know. I’ve been talking to a friend who is a tax accountant. He isn’t concerned. He says the amount is so small it hardly matters. But it’s complicated. I was in Zurich this summer on vacation, and they told me that they didn’t want my account anymore because I am an American. But it’s been really difficult working out a place to move it, and as long as I have it, they aren’t allowed to close it without my permission. So we are both in a Mexican standoff. You know? It’s weird. They want me to close it, but they make it hard to do. And I don’t know if I want to close it. Then, from time to time, I wonder if UBS will fail. But it's probably too big to be allowed to fail. And I don’t even know what is in it exactly. And I can’t get back statements, so I don’t know how much came from what. I’m going to have to figure it out for this year’s taxes. But all I can do is estimate by working out what I should have based on currency versus what I have in there. But how do I find that out?
I’ve been through one audit. I don’t look forward to explaining this to an auditor. My tax buddy says not to worry. I worry. You read this stuff in the news and it’s weird knowing that you are the target of the latest feeding frenzy. I’m hoping some lady will have octuplet minotaurs to bump this off of page one.
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