Taking savings out of China

[jobin]

Just less than ten thousand us dollars (about 75000 rmb) a day in your suitcase should accomodate any money laundering needs, if any, you may have. Since you have the foreign passport, you carry the money, $9900.00, across the HK border, dump it into the bank, then return to shenzhen where your wife waits in the hotel with the millions. Next few days the process repeats daily until your father in laws money, however obtained, illegal or not, in china, is passed out to the west where, one day in the future, the entire family can enjoy the benefits of western life gotten by money from china. What you need is the multiple entry visa, not hard to get with your contacts. A great business plan. Need partners to carry the suitcase??

[XiaoXi]

I must say, it does sound rather funny to "know" that there will be more than 10k made and to worry about getting that money out (even if the business model was successful in the USA and UK) before actually starting operations in China. Then again, better over-prepared than blue-eyed...

If you must know, since I already have business established in the west that will continue while in China, money will be continuously wired into China to support us while we try to establish business in China. This money will also act as capital for the business in China. As well as that we intend to buy some property as investment. The bottom line is, one way or the other, when it comes time to leave there will certainly be money that we want to take out of China.

Having said that though, you should probably look into the formalities of simply using wire transfer. Like other posters I have friends who have sent money to buy houses etc from China to other countries. Even if there are rules that the transfer needs to be approved by a government department, if you are related to a powerful family I'm sure the approval can be arranged.

Yes hopefully simply wiring the money won't be too much of a headache.

[gato]

This money will also act as capital for the business in China.

Legally, foreigners who do business in China are required to do so through a company they set up in China. What you are suggesting is probably not uncommon if the scale of the business is small, but just be aware that you might be doing something that is in a legal gray area or may even be illegal. For anything sizeable (probably anything exceeding US$50K (RMB350K) in annual revenue), you should seriously think about setting up a company.

As well as that we intend to buy some property as investment.

You probably already know that the Renminbi is not a freely-tradeable currency. To keep it from being freely tradeable, the Chinese government has many restrictions on transfer of money in and out of China, and conversion of money into and from Renminbi. The real estate sector is a particular focus of restrictions, as there is a lot of "hot" money in the real estate sector.

See this for example:

http://www.jonesday.com/pubs/pubs_detail.aspx?pubID=S4362

China Introduces Further Measures to Regulate Foreign Investment in its Real Estate Market

Asia

July 2007

[XiaoXi]

Legally, foreigners who do business in China are required to do so through a company they set up in China. What you are suggesting is probably not uncommon if the scale of the business is small, but just be aware that you might be doing something that is in a legal gray area or may even be illegal. For anything sizeable (probably anything exceeding US$50K (RMB350K) in annual revenue), you should seriously think about setting up a company.

Yes I know. For simplicity we will "officially" work as part of my father in law's company. His license will cover what we're going to do since the interpretation of the categories of business is quite broad.

[roddy]

I'm not sure what the actual figures are, but if you are officially employed (with work visa / residence permit) then you can send a chunk of your money home yourself - it's not hassle-free as your father-in-law's company would have to get authorized to employ foreigners, and you'd have to go through all the visa / residence stuff (which you probably thought you could skip, being married), plus you would need to prove you'd paid tax on the money in question, but it's maybe a possibility.

[XiaoXi]

It seems all these Chinese students that transfer money for studies and living fees have to provide evidence of their study etc to the bank before they allow the transfer. Similarly if they're buying a house abroad I should imagine. So if I want to simply transfer money out of the country for no other reason than to have it sitting in my bank in England I may have trouble getting approval I fear.

I'm not sure what the actual figures are, but if you are officially employed (with work visa / residence permit) then you can send a chunk of your money home yourself - it's not hassle-free as your father-in-law's company would have to get authorized to employ foreigners, and you'd have to go through all the visa / residence stuff (which you probably thought you could skip, being married), plus you would need to prove you'd paid tax on the money in question, but it's maybe a possibility.

I think the plan is that officially I'm not working there, just my wife is. I'll just be studying and such. Maybe she can send money to England or my father in law can. I think its best if I talk with the HSBC here and the Bank of China here and get my father in law to talk to those same banks in China too. Hopefully we'll get a definitive answer then. Its certainly something we need to know before even planning on this embark.

[gato]

plus you would need to prove you'd paid tax on the money in question, but it's maybe a possibility.

The OP is probably trying to minimize taxes here, so paying taxes on wage income is probably not what he had in mind.

[imron]

On multiple occasions when I have sent sums of money larger than what foreigners are allowed to transfer out of China, I have done it though a bank transfer. Accompanied by a Chinese friend each time, they required nothing more than their ID card and signature on a form. The sums sent were not huge amounts (

[ted_dc]

I have a similar problem. I have money from my family, in rmb, that I want to transfer out of china. Since chinese citizens can convert up to 50K per year in rmb to US dollars, and wire it out of china, it seems like it would be easy to ask a chinese friend to do this for me. Does anyone know of any problem with this? Other people have suggested "underground" methods. Are there any recommended underground businesses for this?

[imron]

Does anyone know of any problem with this?

I've done it multiple times and never had a problem. I imagine if you wanted to send larger amounts (ie. > 50k) you just need to split it between several friends Considering the above ground method works so well, why bother looking for the underground one?