Your Wealth at Risk

The greatest threats to wealth are risks that are unexpected, uncontrollable, and imposed by others

Making money usually requires some degree of risk. In your investments, market risk allows you to take chances and earn high returns.

Are you a candidate for offshore planning? See below.

But it is not the market that most sophisticated people fear. The greatest threats to wealth are risks that are unexpected, uncontrollable and imposed by others.

• Risk may come from Congress, which in the late 1980s wiped out a generation of accumulated wealth with sweeping changes to federal banking regulations and the Tax Code.

• Risk may come from "injured parties," personal injury lawyers, and juries that are willing to punish you simply for possessing material wealth.

• Risk may come from litigation between former business partners.

• Risk may come from your insurance company, which may deny needed protection or lack the financial strength to meet its obligations to you.

• Risk may come from family members who lack your ability and wisdom. It is not unusual to see accumulated wealth dissipated through the inexperience or ineptitude of its intended beneficiaries.

To manage and reduce their risks, wealthy American have, for generations, turned to estate planning professionals, often utilizing any of several types of trusts to protect wealth from reduction through taxes or unexpected financial threats.

The ideal estate plan. A carefully drafted estate plan accomplishes many goals. It should help you:

• avoid probate,

• reduce taxes,

• protect family members or others who cannot care for themselves,

• dispose of your wealth according to your wishes, and

• protect your wealth from greedy and unscrupulous creditors.

An international financial plan accomplishes these goals and more in ways that traditional domestic strategies cannot.  ●