Tag Archives: Captive Taxation

Jingle Bells

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happy-holidays VCIA hosted our annual holiday party this past Wednesday at the Echo Center on the Burlington waterfront and we had a great turnout. Around 120 of our nearest and dearest friends joined us for wine and beer, with gorgeous hors d’oeuvres from the creative folks of Bon Temp catering who cater our opening receptions at the annual conference.

For those of you who can remember, last year a huge storm dumped much snow on Burlington the exact time of our holiday event. We still had over 50 brave souls who trudged out to make merry that evening, but this past Wednesday was a balmy 50 degrees…so much easier to bring out the crowds. Great seeing old friends such as Dan Labrie, who traveled up from Connecticut with his wife, and new members such as Mark Tabler from Genesis Re, Inc., all the way from Columbus, Indiana!  Thanks to all who came out for such a fun event.

A note of interest regarding 831(b) captives:  The most recent congressional proposal appears to prohibit a captive from making the 831(b) election if the heirs of the business owner own a higher percentage in the electing captive than they do of the operating business.  If you are interested in hearing from some of the best tax minds in the captive business on this and numerous other tax issues, register for our webinar entitled Captive Taxation: Trends and New Developments on December 16, 2015 from 2:00 – 4:00 p.m. EST.

Thank you all very much, and I look forward to hearing from you.

Rich Smith
VCIA President

Insurance to Celebrities

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I was thinking the other day while watching a Tom Hanks film, “I wonder if he started out in the world of Insurance?”  OK, maybe I need a vacation or maybe the Heady Topper I was drinking went to my head a little faster than I thought, but Tom Hanks looks like the prototype insurance guy in a lot of his movies (think “Catch Me If You Can” or his newest, “Bridge of Spies”). So I did what we all do when we have to do some all-encompassing research on a topic: I googled it.

I didn’t necessarily think Brad Pitt, George Clooney or Bil Gates would pop up, and thankfully neither did any of the Kardashians (well, sort of), but I was a little surprised that there weren’t many names that I recognized from my “extensive” research. Here is the list of notable celebrities who started out in insurance:  Anne Rice, Tom Clancy, Colonel Sanders, and, wait for it, Caitlyn (formerly Bruce) Jenner.  Interesting group!  Clearly the world of insurance is keeping our captive stars engaged and happy, thus precluding them from becoming celebrities in some other obscure field, such as acting, writing and fried chicken.

VCIA has a number of captive celebrities participating in our next webinar on December 16. Captive Taxation: Trends and New Developments will include captive stars Tom Jones, Partner at McDermott Will & Emery, Chaz Lavelle, Partner at Bingham Greenebaum Doll, Dan Kusaila, Tax Partner at Crowe Horwath, and Art Koritzinsky, Managing Director at Marsh USA. These guys are the real deal. Go to www.vcia.com to register today!

Thank you all very much, and I look forward to hearing from you.

Rich Smith
VCIA President