Suppose I had to receive wire payments for renting my trading systems: how do I avoid suspicious transaction reports (within the EU)? What type of contract would I need? What kind of payments would you recommend? I have bank accounts in various countries of Europe and in the US. How do you do something like this legally (paying taxes, etc.), considering the person paying me is in another EU country?
Why would you ask a question like that in here?....terrible judgement on your part. Talk to a business/tax attorney in your area for professional advice, not here !!
Well, first - your contract is irrelevant in this area. Simply because the bank never sees it in the transaction, so at the end of the day, whatever contract you have in place will not stop a suspicious transaction report. What you should do: * Make suer what you do is legal. Now, there is nothing illegal in renting out trading systems. i is, though, illegal to run an unlicensed business. * Bascially, open a business, open a business account, write proper invoices and pay your taxes. If your bank knows you are providing internet services (SAAS - Software as a service) it will not thing anything is suspicious with you getting paid regularly. If it is your private checking account, it WILL.
Thank you. This concisely clarifies the nature of my problem. I am not running a business yet. I am "unlicensed". So I agree that I need a contract. And for that I have to ask the question in Italy, where I live. Probably I have to ask a business/tax attorney as advised in the previous post.
Pretty exactly. Opening a business should be pretty fast and standardized. Talk to a tax advisor / accountant.
Lots of people sell junk they used for a while or bought and didn't like on ebay without registering as a business... cause it's not a business. When people have a job (and some have more than one) they receive regular payments too. There is nothing suspicious about that. Regarding contract, you likely need it on a piece of paper only if you are doing something unusual or a substantial sum of money is involved. Lots of software sold (with a single license payment) or leased (regular pyments) via paypal where the only contractual terms are the name of the software and duratiuon of the license purchased.
And lots of people get their asses handed by tax offices when they do that so much that they become powersellers. The moment you do something for a profit it is a business. * Sell used stuff you bought new -> no business. * Buy used stuff, sell it with profit -> business. * Sell / lease software you created -> business. The regular decision is whether do an activity with the intention to create a profit. Bad news: not your decision. Decide wrongly, and the tax office gladly clears up your decision... with a hugh bill attached.
I've posted the same question on another forum in Italy and the final advice was exactly the same: "talk to tax advisor / accountant". Here's what I'll do. I'll wait till I make a few thousands, and spread them over different accounts, so that I definitely do not get reported. Then, once it is clearly worth it and necessary (above a given amount of money), I will talk to the tax advisor here, since it will probably cost me several hundred dollars just to talk to him once.
It should not. An accountant should be FREE to talk to for that (or maybe 40EUR or so). Registering a business should be pretty free, too. All in all possibly 200EUR maximum costs.
Yes, I hope you are right. However, here things are not as simple, and bureaucracy is worse than in most English-speaking countries. That's why people don't abide by the law much more often.