From: IN%"unicorn@schloss.li" "Black Unicorn" 15-MAY-1996 20:46:58.17
So what, pray tell, is the IRS going to do? Impose a "we see no income" fine and seize property?
They can audit, but audits are winable too. An offshore company simply keeps dropping cash into the local business. That's not a crime. The local business is losing money like crazy, but who is to say they are defrauding per se? Bad business judgment is hardly tax fraud, and how do you know (with a properly blinded ownership) that the assets that are pouring into this company with all these expenses are taxible in the U.S. in the first place?
Well, the IRS could ask the very sensible question of where is all this property going to? It's not going to be on the lot of someone is renting it via ecash. You could claim it had been destroyed, although there are supposed to be tracking mechanisms for cars. For land, houses, etcetera, they're going to be suspicious when they find someone living in them. Now, they may not have enough to prosecute on - but they can keep an eye on the business' employees + the people driving those cars around or living on that property to try to catch them doing something illegal; sort of a reverse Al Capone. If enough people are doing this, this surveilance does become impractical. But the transitional period is important. -Allen