Should we worry about section 899 of The Big Beautiful Bill?

Baptiste Wicht

The Poor Swiss
Staff member
Hi,

Some of you have contacted me about the Big Beautiful Bill and especially about the Section 899.
  • This section says that a 20% extra withholding would be levied against foreign investors using US securities.
  • This should only apply to countries that are discriminatory towards the US
Here is a nice video about it:


For now, there is no reason to worry and we should take no action:
  • It has not been voted yet
  • We don't know whether this will apply to Switzerland (depends on whether we are considered a discriminatory country)

However, if it goes into effect, it will make a significant different because this would add at least 20% (potentially 35% depending on how this applies with treaties) increase in dividend withholding. In this case, we may have to switch to IE ETFs (assuming IE has not the same problem). So, there is a lot of unknowns.

What do you think?
 
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