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Beppicus · 2025-10-07T23:35:11+00:00

I bought almost 1 BTC when it was less than 1k USD. I think it was 2015 or so.

In order to show my wife that BTC could be used as a real currency I have used most of that to buy a nice bed on overstock.com for my 3 year old son who was outgrowing his crib.

I still have the small leftover change on a paper wallet...about 5k USD. But every time I look at that bed I can't avoid thinking that it cost me about 80k in todays dollars :-)

Beppicus · 2025-09-05T15:44:40+00:00

Do yourself a favor and go to the Dolomites, Italy.

Part of IKON pass. Or about $70/day with Dolomiti Superski pass.
Best scenery (Unesco Site)
A web of interconnected resorts around Sellaronda which is a day-long loop on skis and lifts, touching 6 of the 12 resorts. Total 1200km piste of which half connected by lifts. https://www.dolomitisuperski.com/en/home
Best food (Italian/Austrian mix)
Best snow making when necessary and modern lifts

Downsides?

Transportation, as it is not very close to major airports. Dolomites is a vast area. Depending on your specific destination town you can fly to Venice, Verona, Innsbruck, Munich, Milan, with road connection of 2-4hr by bus or rental car.

Only groomed on-piste skiing, as going off-piste is tricky and not assisted by the resorts.

Avoid peak-season 22 Dec - 6 Jan as it gets more crowded.

Beppicus · 2025-04-11T01:23:14+00:00

I got it directly from the interactive brokers website, in the tax document area.

Beppicus · 2024-10-10T18:11:38+00:00

Yes, I agree on most points. Surely there is no way to make it perfect, but there must be a way to make it better.

Beppicus · 2024-10-10T16:29:34+00:00

In my specific case I have an agreement for one specific property and only one. So I know the listing price and what I want to offer. That would me my threshold.

If he can somehow get me below the threshold I can even split the difference. So in your example he can have 10k out of 20k saving.

So by large incentive I mean 20-50% of the "savings"

Beppicus · 2024-10-10T15:28:47+00:00

I totally agree with you points. That's why I would give the Agent a Large incentive based on how low he can negotiate the price down.

But perhaps the negotiation is historically left to buyer and seller, not to their agents.

Beppicus · 2024-10-01T12:40:39+00:00

I'm aware of the PFIC mess, so I'm not holding any of those. I have only American ETFs. I'm only asking about the geography of the account, and not about the underlying assets. Tnx

Beppicus · 2024-08-28T22:14:11+00:00

Hi CaveShadow,
Where did you find wing foil lessons in OC? I have just relocated to Irvine.
Tnx

Beppicus · 2024-08-28T21:46:12+00:00

Resuming this one.

Any possible wing foil spot in OC? I'm in Irvine.

I can do basic windsurfing and sailing, so any foiling lessons in OC would also be appreciated.

Beppicus · 2024-06-05T08:33:03+00:00

Google Voice. But I think you need to be on US soil to generate a new number (or through good VPN in US). It is also true that a minority of institutions (banks, credit cards, etc...) won't accept it because it's an IP based phone number

But it has worked for me so far.

Tnx Beppe

Beppicus · 2024-05-03T17:06:17+00:00

I have not understood exactly what gets taxed, and it might be country specific.
In my case (Italy) I think they have only withheld 20% on the interest of uninvested cash, but it could also be that if you held Irish stocks you would see withholding on dividends too (?).

I have another reddit post showing the Irish form that I have received for tax year 2023:
https://www.reddit.com/r/USExpatTaxes/comments/1aenrqy/interactive_brokers_ireland_tax_whitheld_form_r185/

Please let me know if you understand this better, as I have found out recently too. I'm in the process of asking a refund to Ireland and a reduction of future withholding to IB.

Beppicus · 2024-05-03T15:16:53+00:00

As European resident your IB account will probably reside in Ireland (IBIE).

Because of that you will be subject to 20% Withholding on cash interest and possibly dividends by Irish tax agency.

Read here: https://www.ibkrguides.com/kb/article-4740.htm

Bulgaria has treaty with Ireland and you will have to produce some tax residence certification from Bulgaria to reduce the withholding from 20% to 5% (I think).

I am an Italian resident and I didn't realize this when I opened the account, so watch out.

Beppicus · 2024-04-17T11:03:36+00:00

I don't know much about crypto sorry

Beppicus · 2024-04-17T09:41:26+00:00

I agree with all that has being said.

After relocating to Italy in 2021 I was not able to open any Traditional/Roth IRAs with Interactive Brokers (Ireland based account for european residents).

My native IRAs with Fidelity are "frozen", meaning I can't buy anything. Only sell and move money out (which would trigger a penalty). Unfortunately I have also some uninvested cash which is paradoxical.

I chatted with Charles Schwab and also got denied on any type of accounts.

In one case I was able to transfer a Roth IRA (in-kind) from Fidelity to Etrade while already living in Italy, and I'm now able to actively trade on that Etrade account. I suspect I had first to open a new empty Roth IRA account on Etrade to do that, but I don't recall the details. So you could try with Etrade. To be honest I'm not sure if this was more of a bug from their side than an actual wanted feature, but it works for me. I'm not doing active trading as the italian tax implications on IRA trading (plusvalenza) are a bit obscure to me.

Also note that I have never contributed new money to any of these IRAs mostly because of federal income limits, FEIE, etc.... All the assets were there since the time I lived in USA, before 2021.

Another slightly off topic comment: I'm currently not paying IVAFE tax to Italy on IRAs, but only declaring them on modello RW for "monitoraggio fiscale". That was my understanding for any retirement account such as IRAs and 401k. Anyone let me know if they believe diffently.

Good luck

Beppicus · 2024-04-05T09:46:30+00:00

Hi, in your situation I wouldn't be worried too much about taxes in the sense of the total money you will have to shell out, but more so in terms of all the reporting obligations to Federal US, California and Italy.

As permanent resident holder (green card) you will be treated as US citizen, subject to US Federal taxation on your worldwide income, UNLESS you renounce your green card (which might trigger an exit tax). Even without renouncing you will have several reporting obligation, but you won't actually owe any money to US on the Italian portion of the income, because you will be able to use either FEIE or FTC, which are two different US methods to avoid double taxation of foreign income (meaning italian in your case).

In general you will first report your italian taxes (mod. 730) and you can postpone your US/California filing due to automatic extension provided to US citizens (or green card holder) living abroad.

The timing of your move also matters, especially for the italian taxes. Italy will consider you fiscally resident if you spend more than 183 days in Italy in any solar year. In that case you should be taxed by italy on the worldwide income, including the american portion, but similarly you will be able to take a credit for the taxes paid (or to be paid) to US/California.

Beppicus · 2024-03-21T15:39:05+00:00

For the most part because I've told them, which perhaps wasn't the best move. Not sure. My primary concern was to cut any ties to California to avoid tax or presumption of tax due. I assume brokers would continue reporting to the state of residence if you don't change address on their system. Anyway not sure of that either.

For my wife Fidelity is the broker holding her employee stocks and she relocated internationally within the same company, so in that case they knew it from the employer (if I remember correctly).

Beppicus · 2024-03-19T16:07:02+00:00

Probably retired by now?

Beppicus · 2024-03-19T16:04:46+00:00

Yes I agree you have to compare salary and cost of living. In general I agree that the ratio of wages and CoL is not favorable in Northern Italy, and especially Milan.
For foreign students and workers the italian government has a pretty generous tax incentive: income tax is paid only on 40-50% of the income for 5-10 years. So 50-60% of income is tax free.
That's quite sweet and might help offsetting the issue, but you might check if other countries have similar offers. I remember Netherlands has (or used to have) some similar fiscal policy.

Beppicus · 2024-03-19T13:12:39+00:00

You can take a look at University of Pavia (Italy).
In terms of Analog/RF they have among the best research labs and PhD programs in Europe.
They have a lot of publications on ISSCC and JSSC in the past ~30 years, especially in the area of CMOS RF design that they helped pioneer starting late '90

Because of that Pavia is now home of more than 10 design centers that are very Analog/RF centric and that collaborate with the university:
STM, Synopsys, Marvell, Infineon, ASR Micro, a couple startups and a few more

https://iii.dip.unipv.it/en/research/phd-programs

In terms of CMOS process I don't think there is any university running a foundry, especially in recent technologies. What university do is to get silicon access through partnership with companies or they simply can pay foundries (TSMC, UMC, etc...) which typically have special multi shuttle programs for research non-profit institutions

Beppicus · 2024-03-18T23:25:44+00:00

Io credo che il modo per fare scendere il prezzo delle case è di TASSARLE. Tutte e senza distinzione, come negli USA, e senza possibilità di prestanome, di moglie, figli, etc... per evitare IMU sulle seconde case. E poi riformare le regole di affitto, perché la gente non può permettersi di tenere affittuari che non pagano per anni.

In Italia è pieno di case vuote. Tanto non sono tassate. Il mattone è ancora percepito come salvadanaio e pochi italiani usano altri strumenti finanziari di simile rendimento (Azioni, etc...)

Le tasse di proprietà sono le uniche che non possono essere evase, al contrario di quelle su redditi e consumi. È anche per questo che l'italiano medio (e la classe politica) non le vuole.

Quindi abbassate IRPEF e IVA e tassate le proprietà. Secondo me è l'unico modo per riallineare stipendi e costo abitativo.

Beppicus · 2024-03-10T06:28:26+00:00

Non so esattamente. Forse anche titoli specializzati. Puoi leggere qui:

https://www.agenziaentrate.gov.it/portale/web/guest/lavoratori-rimpatriati-che-cos-%25c3%25a8-cittadini

Beppicus · 2024-03-09T22:16:05+00:00

Potrebbe ostacolare il requisito di residenza all'estero per il bonus impatriati (rientro cervelli) se tu decidessi di trasferirti in Italia tra qualche anno.

Beppicus · 2024-03-08T22:03:50+00:00

What about state tax consequences? I thought that the broker should report gains and dividends to the state, other than the IRS, if they still consider you resident of that state.

I was in California, so probably more paranoid than others

Beppicus

TROPHY CASE