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The pay levels for board directors have been increasing as the board members’ responsibilities grow with the need to fully understand and navigate the challenges arising from a variety of areas including geopolitical risk, regulatory complexities, macroeconomic shock, climate/environmental challenges, and technology advancements. Given these change...

Families hire family office staff with the expectation that the office keeps their information, assets, and reputation protected. To safeguard the families’ interests, it’s critical for family offices to ensure that internal controls take the pragmatic approach, starting with four main areas: segregation of duties, transaction volume, managing comp...

New regulations proposed by the IRS seek to address the basic exclusion amount for estate and gift taxes which was doubled in 2017 under the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. The doubling of the exemption is scheduled to sunset on January 1, 2026. When this occurs, how can a donor lock in the increased exemption for years 2018 through 2025? New proposed regul...

A Net Income with Makeup Charitable Remainder Unitrust (NIMCRUT) is a unique wealth planning strategy and is an effective means to maximize after-tax returns, as well as benefiting charities in certain circumstances common to high net-worth families and individuals. This article outlines some ideal circumstances and illustrates the significant diff...

Also known as a family trust company, a private trust company (PTC) is an entity that allows families to unbundle fiduciary services in furtherance of family and financial goals. In this overview and primer, learn more about the elements of the PTC structure, board roles and responsibilities, and when it makes sense to form a PTC.

In this episode, two industry experts share their thoughts and practical guidance on directors and officers insurance (D&O), covering the fundamentals of the protections that A-B-C D&O insurance coverage provides and the three topics that D&O insurers are focused on right now: event-driven litigation such as cyber breaches; ...

Trusts are valuable tools frequently used to transfer wealth within families, preserve and protect wealth, and reduce taxes. Understanding trusts and the role of the trustee is important for the people establishing trusts and the beneficiaries of those trusts. Building on this foundation, answers are provided to some questions about trusts and trus...

As enterprising families expand across generations, they often stray from their entrepreneurial wealth creation roots to a more risk-averse wealth-protection mode. However, if maintaining shared family capital across multiple generations is the goal, wealth protection mode is not an ideal strategy and may have some unintended consequences. Building...

It is not uncommon for enterprising families to end up making sub-optimal capital allocation decisions due to limited visibility into, and planning around, the entirety of their shared family assets. To optimize the value of shared family capital, both the business and other entities or advisors in the enterprise ecosystem must work in harmony. Wit...

Generally, parents lose access to their child’s health and financial information once the child becomes a legal adult at the age of 18 unless certain steps are taken. To this end, here is a list of seven essential legal documents for parents to complete when their children turn 18 and before they go to college or leave hom...

Wealthy families have a significant positive socio-economic impact around the world, but lasting impact depends on those families prospering for generations. This is not guaranteed, however, and more intergenerational wealth transfers succeed if families adopt a modern Family Office model that suits their needs and goes beyond managing and gro...

At its core, a mission statement serves as a compass, continually steering an organization or business toward their goals. For the families who undertake the process of creating a mission statement, it provides a similar and essential navigational tool. To be successful, however, the mission statement must resonate and mean something to everyone in...

From Australia to United States and many places in between, this Global Employer Guide reflects an easy-to-read summary of employment law that changed in each country over the past year, including pandemic-related changes where applicable. Visa processes, employee rights, contract requirements, transfer of business considerations, privacy standards...

Charitable giving is an important goal for many investors. Although any form can be beneficial, proper planning of the when, what, and how can help maximize the donor’s philanthropic as well as overall wealth planning goals. In examining some common charitable giving strategies, the advantages and disadvantages are discussed, and examples are prese...

The use of a specific ownership structure to provide for the deduction of investment management fees has evolved since 1941 to most recently in 2018 when guidance was provided by the U.S. Tax Court in determining whether the activities of a family investment management company constitute a trade or business. With a review of the details of tha...