There have been a number of posts lately by American expats (myself included, though it's clear I am not alone wrestling with this) on the myriad challenges they face in trying to invest while overseas. Yesterday's thread by mcc57 suggests that one of options that has seemed to be favored by some (Schwab) may be closing its doors to certain Americans.
As I indicated in a previous post, I've been told by Fidelity reps that my taxable account should remain open and allow trading in ETFs after I move to the UK, but I have zero confidence that this (1) is actually true, or (2) if true, will remain true. Past posts have suggested that keeping a US address (friends and family) is a workaround, but this is not appealing to many who wish to be completely transparent, and it also seems to be ending as firms ramp up scrutiny (and there may be undesirable state tax effects as well).mcc57 wrote: ↑Mon Aug 05, 2019 2:51 pm I'm a US citizen but have been living in Italy for the last few years years. I've had a Schwab account for the longest time. When I moved to Europe a few years back, Schwab warned me that - as a result of my move - I could no longer make certain investments (such as mutual funds), but could certainly invest and trade ETFs.
All of this has worked fine until today I received a phone call from Schwab informing me that AS OF SEPTEMBER 2019, as a UE resident I will NO LONGER be allowed to invest and trade ETFs.
Has anyone else experienced this or heard of this?
So I'm trying to think of options. Has anyone looked into setting up a US LLC (I guess ideally in a no-tax state) to hold taxable investments? To be clear, the intent here would not be any kind of tax-avoidance, US or foreign. It just occurs to me that a trading account in the name of a US LLC might prevent account closure (and trading restrictions). I'm sure it would add substantially to compliance costs, but I'd be willing to bear those (within reason) if it offered a clear legal path to maintaining investments while overseas.