EMET Law Firm
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EMET Law Firm

Approach

EMET works differently from a lawyer-for-hire or an annual filing service. The practice is built on four principles: one position, a long horizon, a coordinated external posture, and active engagement.

01

A coordinated position, not a collection of answers

Tax residency, reporting, banking compliance, inheritance decisions, and asset structure form one position — not five separate questions. EMET advises that position as a single coherent matter.

A client with assets across three jurisdictions, advised by a separate adviser on each topic, ends up holding three incompatible positions. When a private bank asks a source-of-funds question, the answer needs to come in one voice — not in three contradictory ones. When an inheritance decision touches assets in Russia, Switzerland, and Cyprus, it must account for all three jurisdictions at the same time, not one after the other.

One adviser seeing the full picture is not a preference; it is a technical requirement for clients whose affairs cross borders.

02

Long horizon

Tax and legal decisions rarely play out within a single year. A change of residency today affects capital gains five years out, inheritance obligations in fifteen years, and bank reporting every year until the relationship ends.

EMET frames a client's position on a five-to-ten-year horizon, not against the next filing deadline. The work is not «closing the year in March» — it is moving alongside the client through life events: relocation, sale of a business, purchase of property in a new jurisdiction, birth of a child, inheritance, restructuring of family capital. Each of these shifts the position, and each requires someone to carry the full picture forward.

This is the reason most clients have worked with Eduard close to ten years — not as a marketing claim, but as a consequence of how the practice works.

03

Coordinated external posture

Banks, regulators, foreign tax advisers — every external party should receive the same coordinated position, not different versions depending on who answered.

EMET prepares responses to private banks on source-of-funds, residency status, and declared income; in most jurisdictions runs the local side with its own team, with Italy, Cyprus, and Greece handled through local partners. For the client, EMET itself acts as the family office: coordination with all external parties stays inside the firm. The client is not left translating messages between parties or receiving contradictory letters from separate advisers.

04

Active engagement, not reactive

Most «unexpected» problems — a bank source-of-funds inquiry, an unforeseen tax obligation in a new jurisdiction, an extended CFC review — are in fact predictable months or years in advance. They become unexpected only when no one is watching for them.

Annual engagement at EMET includes regular review of the client's position against upcoming changes: new banking requirements, shifts in local tax law, client life events. The aim is to see a problem before it becomes a query. Reactive work happens, of course, but in this model it is the exception rather than the rule.

Discuss your situation

A short conversation helps clarify the jurisdictions, the horizon, and the parties involved in building a coherent position.

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CFC

CFC (controlled foreign company) — a foreign entity in which a tax resident of a given jurisdiction holds a controlling stake above the statutory threshold. Most developed tax systems (Russia, EU member states, the United States, the United Kingdom and others) apply their own versions of CFC rules: the controlling person is required to disclose the structure, file financial reporting of the controlled entity and, in defined cases, pay tax on its undistributed profit in their residency country.

The aim of the regime is to prevent artificial profit shifting into a low-tax jurisdiction through a formally foreign but effectively controlled company. The specific thresholds, the scope of obligations and the conditions of undistributed-profit taxation are determined by each jurisdiction individually.

Tax residency

Tax residency — the status that determines in which jurisdiction a person is required to declare worldwide income and pay tax on it. Under the Russian system a person qualifies as a tax resident where they spent 183+ days in Russia within any 12 consecutive months; in other jurisdictions the rules differ and may include day-count tests, centre of vital interests, permanent home and the applicable double-taxation treaty.

Tax residency is not the same as immigration residency. A residence permit, an EU residency card or permanent right to reside does not by itself make a person a tax resident of the jurisdiction — not if they do not physically live there. Conversely, a person can become a tax resident of a country in which they hold no formal residence permit, where they meet the factual tests (for example, spending 183+ days a year there).

Reporting

The body of recurring filings a person submits to the tax authorities of their residency jurisdiction: income tax returns, notifications on foreign accounts and assets, CFC reports and other periodic forms. The logic and frequency of reporting depend on the specific jurisdiction, the form of ownership and the character of the income.

For persons with assets in multiple countries reporting is always layered: the residency country taxes worldwide income, while the countries where the assets are situated retain the primary right to tax local-source income — the same position therefore appears in multiple filings, with double taxation eliminated through the applicable treaties.

Foreign portfolio

The body of a person's investment assets held outside their tax-residency jurisdiction: bank accounts, brokerage portfolios, investment funds, equity stakes in foreign entities, real estate abroad. From the standpoint of the owner's residency country, such a portfolio forms a distinct layer of tax, currency and reporting obligations.

Managing a foreign portfolio intersects with CFC rules, the currency-control regulation of the residency country and automatic exchange of tax information (CRS), under which banks and brokers report client data to the tax authorities of the client's residency jurisdiction.

Inheritance

Inheritance — the formal legal procedure for transferring assets after the owner's death. It is initiated by the opening of the estate, runs through notarial channels and is governed by the law of the jurisdiction in which each asset is situated. The procedure involves valuation of the estate, allocation of compulsory shares (under civil law systems), payment of inheritance tax in each country where the assets are located, and registration of the transfer to the heirs. The typical timeline runs from 6 months to 2 years; where multiple jurisdictions are involved, parallel procedures run with mutual legalisation of documents.

A formal inheritance procedure is heavily regulated and often disadvantageous for owners with international wealth. Until the process is complete, a significant share of the estate is effectively frozen — bank accounts are blocked, transfer of real estate requires judicial or notarial action, company shares cannot be sold. Inheritance taxation in a number of jurisdictions is heavy (Germany 7-50%, France up to 60%, the United Kingdom 40%), and reduced personal allowances for non-residents often increase the effective burden further. The procedure is also public, which is incompatible with the level of confidentiality HNWI families typically maintain.

A separate complication is the conflict of legal systems. Assets scattered across different countries are inherited under the rules of each situs jurisdiction, and those rules differ materially: forced-heirship shares (légitime / Pflichtteil) under civil-law systems, formal requirements for a valid will, recognition of foreign marriages and marital contracts, the surviving spouse's entitlements, and procedures for the legalisation of documents. A will valid under Russian law may be only partly recognised by a German, French or Italian court — and vice versa. In an international configuration the testator's wishes may not in fact be executed: they pass through the public-policy filter of each country in which assets are located, and absent a pre-structured arrangement the actual outcome often diverges from the owner's intentions.

Standard practice is therefore to structure the transfer before death, so that assets either fall outside the estate altogether or pass through it in the most efficient form for the family. The main instruments: lifetime gift (Schenkung) with the use of periodically renewing tax-free allowances; family corporate structure (Family GmbH, Familienpool) — transfer of shares in a holding entity rather than the underlying assets; private foundation (Stiftung — Liechtenstein, Austria; Foundation — Panama, Curaçao) — assets are removed from the founder's personal estate; trust (common law jurisdictions) — sits outside the formal estate; joint ownership with right of survivorship in jurisdictions where it is recognised; life and accumulation insurance with named beneficiaries — the pay-out is excluded from the estate in many systems.

The choice of instrument depends on the jurisdiction in which each asset is situated, the tax residency of the testator and the heirs, the family configuration, the nature of the assets (real estate, business interests, portfolio, personal property) and the planning horizon. No universal structure exists; each family is analysed individually.