Tax scams, offshore partners and millionairesses – April wealth links

Tuesday, April 20, 2010 | Posted by: Fiona Cullinan
Categories: Personal | Tags: tax, links, HMRC, offshore, wealth, women, James Caan, tax haven, millionaire, Duncan Bannatyne, Felix Dennis, phishing, scams

Who wants to be a millionaire? Girls do, apparently – and they’re succeeding in ever increasing numbers. Also this month – how much counts as rich, the latest tax scams being carried out in the name of the HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) and other wealth-related stories here on the Bespoke blog.

Number of self-made women millionaires rises 40% in five years : The UK now has 72,000 female multi-millionaires with liquid assets of more than £2.5 million. Many invested in property or started their own niche business. The survey also notes that investment decisions are now more likely to be made jointly between husband and wife.

UK tax scams to watch out for : A list by HMRC of email and telephone phishing scams to look out for around tax time, from tax rebate offers to notices of under-reported income – plus how to spot they’re a fake.

Offshore issues have BBC Dragons breathing fire at each other : Can a business relationship go sour if a non-UK-domiciled partner is invested in an offshore tax jurisdiction? It has for BBC Dragons’ Den stars Duncan Bannatyne and James Caan, who holds non-domiciled resident tax status and whom Bannatyne claims has a UK private equity company owned by a Cayman Island company.

How much counts as rich these days? : UK publisher turned poet Felix Dennis has put a scale on it, with £1-2 million ranking as merely “comfortably poor” and between £3 million and £4 million as “comfortably off.” The adjectives increase as you slide up the scale from the lesser, seriously, truly, filthy and super rich. He rates himself as “filthy rich” – between £400 million and £999 million net worth.

Tin-can collector who died a millionaire : You don’t have to be rich to create wealth. This is the tale of a thrifty Swede who roamed the streets for 30 years but was found to have invested his pennies in mutual funds, gold and savings accounts. He died with $1.4 million to his name, only to have his will contested.

Image: Howard Lake, 2009

Read more Bespoke links.