---Still i think offshore banking is the best, for getting at least 3% a year, with zero risk, for 12 month, and on and on and on.--- i'm not arguing with you. in fact i agree. but imo TODAY ,for US citizen it's better and safer not to have anything "offshore". dunno if you are US citizen or not,but feels like you are not and you have no idea how difficult for regular joe to move the money around. i'm talking about large sums of money. + tax reporting of all such activities.i can almost guarantee that you will be audited with deep cavity search. btw-3% is not a big deal. i have 3% CD from one of NY banks,FDIC insured(this what i call almost zero risk,because still-there is a risk that FDIC may go caput(but on other hand-since it's a federal agency-gvt pretty much print as many dollars as needed to cover the bankruptcy of the agency). and maturity on this CD is many many years away 2% on regular saving account is also possible to find in US,without going crazy far and crazy tax complications with "offshore " accounts. but after taxes + inflation-still not enough to even preserve buying power,forget the growth http://www.forbes.com/sites/robertwood/2012/03/12/despite-fatca-fbar-penalties-still-under-fire/ i suggest you to study all those forms,requirements and regulations. i guarantee that somewhere on the middle of it you will give up this idea,if you are regular US citizen. i'm doing my taxes now.the tax report is over 1000 pages for my little family. i spend couple days preparing it...then i spend another 4 hours with our accountant, to double check everything. this is how f** complex all this shit is in US..i can guarantee you royal pain in ass with your offshore accounts. i'm not saying that this is impossible,but current laws and regulations in US are against it. the timing for such activities can't be any worse.
how about this? http://www.sbrf.ru/en/privateclients/deposits/fixedterm/ 8% on accounts in rubles and i can open an account(cause i still have my russian citizenship). why i don't have an account over there? same reason-currency risk. btw-they are paying 4% on accounts in USD.
I am not US citizien. I am german and live in europe. All this laws are really extremly stressing. Why dont you use a tax lawyer, a proffessional in taxes (dont know the english word) but someone who does all this stuff for you. That isnt so expensive. That 8% on rubles or 4% on USD, sounds great. If you only do it always for one year, it cant much happen in the FX market. Why not try it? I would. Get yourself help from proffessional people who have studied this stuff and their job is to help people, who cant see through the jungle of laws - thats why they are there.
cause most of the "professionals" know nothing. and \OR will charge you an arm and leg for their services. wanna talk with tax lawyer about your offshore ideas? how about $500-1000 in hour? pro accountant? $1000-2000 for income tax preparation. wait..there is no any guarantee that everything will be perfect and will not trigger any penalties or audit from IRS. that's why i have to do it by myself. cause i've been there already.and i do that for over 10 years. everything match up to a dollar. never got any request from IRS,never got any penalties and once $1 refund. ----- That 8% on rubles or 4% on USD, sounds great. If you only do it always for one year, it cant much happen in the FX market. Why not try it? I would.----- cause i can get 3 or close to 3 here,in US, without moving my ass from my chair. or i have to go to moscow(add tickets,meals and hotel expenses(and they pretty damn expensive in moscow)),go to the bank,open an account,fill numerous papers about my income on both sides of the ocean. all this for a difference of less than 1 %? f**k it.
Stick to what you know. The vast majority of people who start trading never make even 25k profit, let alone 250k. The most likely outcome is that you lose some or all of your $250k before you learn how to trade, and there's an excellent chance (90%+) that you never become never net profitable. My advice is do something related to what made you the 250k in the first place.
Your life sounds pretty complicated. Maybe a trip to Moscow wouldt harm you, at least you would get out of your chair. How i said 3% are great, if you resident in Australia, you get 5%. LOL Have a nice thursday
Thanks for all the replies and recommendations I opened a very small trading account and a virtual account to start and see what happens. Also what is the best online trading platform for foreign securities and is that a good idea?
what securities are you talking about in particular? stocks,futures,bonds whatever IB covers pretty much everything around the world and very retail friendly in terms of commissions. they also have paper account,which will be exact copy of your own. http://www.interactivebrokers.com/ibg/main.php
Better make your family get used to a tight budget, things could get rough. Maybe you'll be an instant wizard but it is easier to scale lifestyle up than down.
I recommend you open a trading account with a forex broker and get autotrade signals from a site like mythostrading.com