Wealth structuring
Private client
Today, we are the only global law firm dedicated to the personal and private capital needs of high-net-worth individuals and families.
Many of our clients’ needs are purely domestic. Others are international families with interests in a number of locations. In a fast-moving and increasingly compliance-focused world, the need for integrated advice that reaches across borders has never been greater. With offices across Europe, the United States and Asia-Pacific, we provide coverage that other law firms in this area cannot match.
Whether you require advice on legal and tax structuring for your business and investments, family and business governance, tax and estate planning or help with a vulnerable person in your family, our private client attorneys will deliver tailored solutions to meet your specific needs.
Clients from every walk of life
Our clients have achieved success in many fields, from senior executives to multi-generational families, to owners, managers and investors in private capital and some of the world’s wealthiest people. In Europe, we have represented 66% of The Sunday Times top 100 Rich List and over 25% of The Forbes 400 List of the Wealthiest Americans; in Asia we act for 35% of the Hong Kong Forbes Rich List.
We act not just as private client lawyers but trusted advisers, looking to build strong relationships with yourself and other professionals advising you. This is one of the reasons we are proud to have been asked to represent families down the generations.
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15 December 2020 - Article
DAC6 – what does the EU's latest tax reporting legislation mean for private clients and their advisers?
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11 December 2020 - Article

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01 July 2020 - Article

04 May 2020 - Article

13 March 2020 - Article
Making a lifetime gift may be easy to do, but has it been done properly and what else should you bear in mind?
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06 February 2020 - Article

06 February 2020 - Article
Coronavirus FAQs from individuals and families in the UK
As our clients are adapting to a new way of living amidst the current coronavirus pandemic, we have recognised and addressed many of their unanswered questions and difficult decisions they are facing that they hadn’t anticipated before now.
Our reputation has been built on quality of service, integrity and building a long term partnership with our clients. Withers shares these values and their input from Hong Kong and London has made an important contribution to our success over recent years.
The advice I receive is excellent. The team is very responsible, responsive, competent, pleasant to deal with and earned my trust. I would recommend Withers highly.
Our aim is to help our clients stay at the cutting edge of the market, and we expect our legal partners to have a sophisticated global view that provides our clients with accurate and cost-efficient solutions to their legal problems. We have worked with Withers for many years.
We enjoy working with a dynamic US/UK legal team in London and now collaborate across a wide range of practices within the firm. Acting together, we are able to offer advice on virtually every aspect of a client’s tax and financial planning.
Withers is the law firm we look to for legal issues for our US/UK clients; often with a complex tax background. The firm’s depth of knowledge and experience is excellent, on all trust and tax related legal issues, including tax controversy.
We share with Withers a determination to help families to optimise their vision for the future. Withers’ broad experience in working with both domestic and international families makes the firm an ideal partner, and we don’t hesitate to recommend them to our clients.
Withers Italian tax team is outstanding for issues related to family business, family governance and generational change.
They are very knowledgeable and practical, and they have enough jurisdiction specialities in their firm. They are good on the US tax side, and they very much understand the local culture and clients as well.
Successful private client practice offering a broad range of non-contentious services including wealth structuring and estate planning. Also regularly handles high-profile trusts and succession disputes. Well-established London presence with recognised offices in Asia-Pacific, Europe and the USA.
The firm offers a diverse range of services and is particularly well suited to meet the needs of complex international clients, adding: the client support and advice is consistently high quality and comprehensive across jurisdictions.
How the private client team can help
Meet the team
View AllTrack record
An art heir
The US-born son of a UK businessman
When he became engaged to a Swiss citizen, the son of a high-profile UK businessman asked us to help him obtain a British Passport and expatriate from the US. We were also asked to draft a prenuptial agreement. Timing was of the essence but as a global, full-service firm we created a team of immigration, family and private client lawyers to meet tight deadlines.
Blenheim Palace
The trustees wished to transfer the business of opening the Palace to the public, to a new charity that would allow for the maximization of revenue through gift aid receipts and increased access to grants. Our cross-departmental team put together an innovative structure that allowed the often competing obligations and requirements of the Charity Commission, HMRC and the Palace to be met and the charity opened for business in 2017.
North Asian family
Managing unexpected wealth
A married couple who held shares in a US company came to us after coming into considerable wealth when it was sold. We helped them to handle the complex tax obligation arising from the windfall and advised on how to protect their privacy. We also discussed routes to philanthropic giving, an area that they were keen to explore and one in which Withers has considerable experience.
International football manager
We advised the manager of an international football club to negotiate a very complex scenario around the taxation of image rights, where the negotiating parties had very different backgrounds and interests and rules between the UK and their European country of residence varied greatly. Our multilingual team in the UK were able to liaise with the team in his home country to provide a seamless solution. Image rights are a classic area where one needs to understand both sides of the common law/civil law equation, which few firms could have provided.
A South American family
We worked with a South American family with significant business interests when they chose to liquidate holdings in a multi-billion dollar business outside their home country. The family wanted to diversify their exposure and explore more sophisticated investment opportunities. We advised on the creation of a holding structure for their investments and helped them to establish a family office, based in New York, to advise it.
Multi generational South East Asia family
We were instructed by this family, consisting of several members spanning two generations, in relation to setting up a private trust company structure (PTC). The PTC acts as a trustee of a master trust to hold the family office, family business and family investment entity. The beneficiaries of the master trust were a series of "feeder" trusts established for the benefit of each of the family members and their respective families together with a number of charitable entities. In addition, we advised the family on establishing a sophisticated governance structure, including a family council and family constitution.
A wealthy European family
A European family asked us to create an overarching trust structure to hold their commercial interests in the UK, Greece, Cyprus, Singapore and elsewhere. Resident in Monaco and London, the family needed the structure to operate as an estate plan, enabling wealth to be passed between generations. This was all done in conjunction with a family constitution governing the management of their wealth.
Post mortem globe trotting
A typical case involved co-ordinating multi-jurisdictional succession and probate processes in a large international estate that had a global spread of beneficiaries with individual tax and asset allocation requirements. We successfully defended a challenge by HMRC to the deceased's domicile status, dealt with the presentation of a complex double tax treaty claim relating to immediate estate and Inheritance taxes, advised on the management of cross jurisdictional income and capital gains tax exposure during the administration period and on conflicts of laws issues impacting on the burden of tax liabilities, generally.
A wealthy Kazakh family
Chilean businessman
High-net-worth individual relocating to Italy
We advised our client, who was formerly living in the UK, in his relocation to Italy under the new Italian resident non-domiciled regime, which he has been authorized status of. This was the first green light issued from the Italian tax authorities on the newly-introduced regime, made possible by our cross border team in Milan and London.
Cross border issues relating to Dementia
When our client was diagnosed with an aggressive form of early onset dementia, he was forced to retire earlier than he or his family had expected and planned for. Leaving his job overseas and relocating to the UK brought about greater difficulties. We assisted his children as their father's attorney in resolving a complex retirement and permanent health insurance package with his employers. We also made an application to the Court of Protection for its approval of the package.
An ultra high-net-worth Asian family
Our Singapore office helped a wealthy Asian family to design and implement a wealth-holding structure that would segregate assets of different classes. Our clients hoped to rationalise a disparate set of holding structures, protect their assets and implement some effective family governance, and we were able to meet all their objectives.
A Channel Island company
Our client, a company based in the Channel Islands, was the owner of a significant property in London, for which we had been advising them on a long-running planning dispute to transform the site, which had been decommissioned as a hospital. When a decision was made to in fact sell the property, it was anticipated there would be significant liability to capital gains tax on the basis that it would be treated as a residential property. By detailed analysis of the legislation we were able to advise that the property should not be subject to tax on sale.
Representing Canadian entrepreneur
Our client is a prominent Canadian entrepreneur with US ties, who we have advised for over a decade. Amongst an array of legal services, this has included coordinating her worldwide succession planning structure and advising on postnuptial co-ordination for her second marriage to protect her substantial global business interests.
One of the wealthiest families in Argentina
Advised on the creation of a long term governance and succession planning structure for one of the wealthiest families in Argentina in order to ensure family control of the business across generations, educate younger generation family members on governance responsibilities and protect the value of the holdings.
The estate of a leading British retailer
We assisted in the probate and estate administration of a member of the family behind a successful British retail business. The deceased was UK resident ‘non dom’, but with arguable common law domicile, and survived by a spouse, children and grandchildren. He held assets globally, some within a complex web of lifetime trusts, and had made wills in different jurisdictions. We managed the difficult domicile claim, co-ordinated probate applications globally and balanced the dynastic plan for the business.
Structuring trusts for wealthy Argentine family
Represented a wealthy Argentine family to structure trusts for both their personal and business interests. Our planning allowed this family to minimize domestic wealth tax, ensure compliance with US tax regulations, form a voting trust for the family business and facilitate commercial lending transactions.
Brazilian family
Aided a Brazilian family with significant US commercial real estate holdings to restructure the ownership of this property to avoid US estate tax. Also devised arrangements for Brazilian residents to create legitimate structures that are protected from Brazilian taxation, permit efficient repatriation of capital to Brazil when needed and ensure optimal flexibility and family control to respond to changing needs and tax laws in the future.
Clients in Chile, Mexico and Venezuela
Advised clients with cross-border interests in relation to the construction of private trust company structures, which effectively allowed for family business succession planning, cost reduction and greater control over certain trust decisions and tax minimization in the jurisdiction of domicile and internationally.
Colombian family's US passport surrender
Colombian family offshore assets
Billionaire Mexican family
Financial institutions in Mexico
US children of Peruvian parents
Venezuelan family in relocation
Venezuelan family's assets
Acted for a Venezuelan family concerned about security and control of the family's assets now and for future generations. This resulted in a comprehensive restructuring of their worldwide assets, including the reorganization of existing trusts and creation of a flexible set of arrangements for the migration of trusts to separate jurisdictions for different beneficiaries.
First Italian non-dom
Clients domiciled in India and Pakistan
Advising a number of clients who are domiciled in India and Pakistan on the structure of their wills to maximize the possibility of tax treaties with the UK applying on death. This can protect UK assets from charges to UK inheritance tax notwithstanding the clients being UK deemed domiciled through long term residence.
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