banking - Offshore Banking

An offshore bank is a bank located outside the country of residence of the depositor in a low- or no- tax jurisdiction. It provides financial and legal advantages like privacy, reduced legal restrictions, and protection against local political or financial instability. Offshore banking has increased rapidly all over the world since mid-1960s because of the growth and liquidity of Eurocurrency markets. The full spectrum of financial services from offshore banks include deposit taking, credit, money transmissions, provision of foreign exchange, letters of credit and trade finance, investment custody, investment management, fund management, trustee services, and corporate administration. Offshore banks provide access to politically and economically stable jurisdictions that may be an advantage for those resident in areas where there is a risk of expropriation or where there is corruption within the banking system. Many offshore banks offer services that may be unavailable in one's country of residence, such as paperless bank statements. Offshore banks in several nations participate in mandated bank account deposit protection insurance systems. Some offshore banks may even provide higher interest rates than banks in the home country, but the fees and minimum deposits required to open and operate accounts at some offshore banks can make them inaccessible to the general public. The majority of offshore banks operate within highly regulated environments under national monetary bodies such as the IMF. These banks are required to maintain capital adequacy requirement in accordance with international standards. They must submit financial reports at least quarterly to the regulator on the current state of their business. One common misconception about offshore banking is that it can legally prevent assets from being subject to personal income tax or interest. For those persons who meet fairly complex requirements, this conception is not applicable because the personal income tax of most countries makes no distinction between interest earned in local banks and those earned abroad. For instance, people subject to pay US income tax are required to declare any offshore bank accounts they may have. Banking provides detailed information about banking, banking jobs, banking services, and more. Banking is affiliated with Swiss Bank Accounts. Article Source:http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Eddie_Tobey banking - Explore Asset And Sales Finance Solutions With Your Bank If you're starting up a business, it can be hard to grasp the terminology you need in order to speak to your bank about funds; when it comes to discussing asset and sales finance, for instance, things can get tricky. It is, firstly, important to know what asset and sales finance is: a service through which banks help businesses obtain a range of equipment, including plant and machinery, commercial vehicles, IT equipment, office furniture and cars. Essentially, sales financing will help you get quick access to cash, while asset financing will help fund business equipment. Many banks offer several cost-effective and expedient sales financing solutions; and with such solutions, businesses can find enough working capital to be able to operate. Two sales financing solutions are factoring and invoice discounting. With factoring (recourse and non-recourse),up to 95% of the value of approved invoices can be advanced within a given period of time with the balance being paid on receipt. And while invoice discounting (also recourse and non-recourse) functions in a similar way, there is a crucial difference between the two: in factoring, the client's customers are made aware of the bank's involvement with the business; in invoice discounting they are not. Another method of sales financing used by many banks is stock finance; this allows you to release as much as 60% of the funds tied up in eligible stock through a completely flexible system. This will release finance that is usually not available for working capital needs. Asset financing solutions will help you gain assets in an economical way, without eating into your cash reserves. As with sales financing, banks will often offer a range of asset finance solutions to its business customers. Hire Purchase, for example, can help you acquire the asset you need right away, but payments can be spread across the life of the asset in question. This may also allow you to keep the asset at the end of your term for a particular fee. Operating Lease asset finance will allow you to benefit from a particular asset, while the bank itself takes on the risk of losing its value; the rental and return conditions for the asset are fixed at the outset. Many banks will offer a variety of asset finance products that cover the needs of a wide range of businesses, be they technological or agricultural. Barclays Asset and Sales Finance, for instance, offer a Technology Lease asset finance product to help finance your technology needs, as well as an Agricultural Lease, which offers finance to buy machinery, vehicles and land, as well as many other benefits. So if you're planning to start up a business, or you run an established business in need of asset and sales financing products, check out your bank's asset and sales financing solutions to see what difference they can make.