April 16, 2018
OneLife organised a series of events in March in Zurich Geneva and Luxembourg to showcase OneLife solutions for Iberia and Latin America. We were privileged to collaborate with some of the best lawyers from Mexico, Peru, Colombia, Portugal, Spain and Brazil.
During these events, there was a panel especially dedicated to opportunities and challenges faced in Brazil when it comes to holding a foreign life assurance policy, as well as the use of such a product as a cross-border solution for Brazilians relocating to Portugal. Other panels included cross-border opportunities in Portugal, due to the increasing number of expatriates moving there in the past few years due to the Non-Habitual Resident (NHR) Regime.
Brazil
Priscila Stela Mariano da Silva from Pinheiro Neto law firm in Brazil and Filipe Romao from Uria Menendez law firm in Portugal composed the Brazilian panel. The discussion was kicked off by Priscila explaining that, as a rule, individuals domiciled in Brazil are not allowed to purchase and directly hold a foreign life insurance policy.
Bearing in mind this general rule, the panel then discussed that these restrictions should be specifically imposed on individuals and legal entities resident/domiciled in Brazil. Thus, based on the territoriality principle of Brazilian law, they could not prevent foreign companies from buying insurance coverage from foreign insurance companies even if some of the risks are located in Brazil. Under these circumstances, it would be feasible that an individual contracts a life insurance policy whilst tax resident abroad and before moving to Brazil. Similarly, it would be possible to purchase a life insurance policy by a private investment company covering risks related to individuals resident in Brazil.
Moreover, Filipe highlighted the growing interest of Brazilian nationals moving to Portugal in the past years and the fact that those individuals would be able to then contract a life assurance policy as Portuguese tax residents. Filipe also drew our attention to the fact that many Brazilians moving to Portugal still hold off-shore structures in tax havens due to the lack of strong CFC and transparency rules in Brazil. However, he warned that holding such structures would be very problematic in Portugal, as any payment arising from these jurisdictions to Portuguese residents would be heavily taxed (35%). Therefore, these clients must seek tax advice before they relocate in order to assess if those structures should be re-domiciled or dismantled.
Portugal
Sara Zad from Carnegie Investment Bank in Sweden and Marta Duarte from Cuatrecasas law firm in Portugal participated in the Portuguese panel and discussed cross-border opportunities related to Swedish nationals moving to Portugal.
Sara provided input about the legal and tax framework of a life assurance policy in Sweden and shared with us her experience with Swedish clients moving to Portugal, such as the profile of clients that tend to consider Portugal as their new tax residence jurisdiction and their usual type of asset/investment portfolio. She also mentioned that in light of recent international tax developments such as BEPS and CRS, Swedish clients are favouring life insurance policies over Trusts and other offshore structures.
Finally, given the growing interest from expatriates in moving to Portugal due to the NHR regime, Marta presented the main features and framework of the regime, as well as how a foreign life assurance policy would be treated under this tax regime and what clients should take into consideration before moving to Portugal.
We would like to thank all our partners who attended this event as well as our panel of international speakers.
In case you were not able to attend our roadshows and would like information about the opportunities in Iberia and Latam, do not hesitate to get in touch with us. We hope to see you at our next events!
Taïza Ferreira, Senior Wealth Planner for Latam markets, at OneLife
Gonzalo Garcia-Perez, Wealth Planner Manager for Iberia and Latam markets, at OneLife
Read “Iberia/Latam roadshows in Zürich, Geneva, Luxembourg: highlights – Part I” => Here!
