Post: #1

Through descent I just got recognized as an EU citizen, I was born in the USA.

I also have a small independent income ( about $1600/mo) -- enough to live in maybe a medium size city in Portugal, but definitely not in Paris for instance without really struggling.

For confidentiality reasons I don't want to say what country I got it through, but it's sort of irrelevant because any EU citizenship gets you in work/living privileges to any EU country as far as I know.

Any ideas for a good, small city to swoop? I'm already considering Ukraine, but after I find someone there, I might have a better lifestyle in a Western Europe country-- better food, services..I know I don't need EU citizenship to go to Ukraine,
I'm kind of thinking where to go after I get a white hot GF.

The catch-- I love mountains, would like to be within 2 hours of some kind of mountains. Although near the shore could be -- tolerable I guess. ..

Of course, I understand now the best way to keep a girl is for her to be aware there are always others waiting.

Post: #2

Independent income? Online biz?

Post: #3

(06-26-2011 10:16 PM)Dash Global Wrote:  Independent income? Online biz?

I hold stocks conservatively and sell options against them, if you're not familiar with it my particular racket is called "covered calls." Easy to search for.

You SELL stock options to the gamblers while owning stocks of huge corporations it would take WW3 to bring down . It's like being the
"house", you don't make killings, but you usually win; although if a stock leaps 10% in a week you don't get all of that, the gamblers get most.

You only need about 30k to make $200 per week.

Just DON'T buy new, unstable companies ( pharma corps with ONE drug
that might get approved. )

Chevron, for instance, has offices in I think over 170 countries. It's probably more powerful than most countries, except for maybe USA, Japan, China, and Brazil.

Sure it's _possible_ Chevron's stock might lose 80%, but if THAT happens I'm going to have more serious problems to deal with like worldwide famine and
chaos.

I learned all about it for free from phils stock world. He has a subscription service but gives you a lot for free. I just used the concepts to build my own portfolio.

Post: #4

Does the US allow dual citizenship when you are born in the US and not through Naturalization?

I was told US dies not allow dual citizenship; unless you were born outside US and naturalized as a US citizen.

In that case, I can get a EU passport too, both grandparents born in Spain.

Mixx

Post: #5

(06-26-2011 10:43 PM)MiXX Wrote:  Does the US allow dual citizenship when you are born in the US and not through Naturalization?

I was told US dies not allow dual citizenship; unless you were born outside US and naturalized as a US citizen.

In that case, I can get a EU passport too, both grandparents born in Spain.

Mixx

It is entirely legal. I've had dual citizenship (US and UK/EU) for most of my life, and I was born here.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Stat...itizenship

Post: #6

(06-26-2011 10:43 PM)MiXX Wrote:  Does the US allow dual citizenship when you are born in the US and not through Naturalization?

I was told US dies not allow dual citizenship; unless you were born outside US and naturalized as a US citizen.

In that case, I can get a EU passport too, both grandparents born in Spain.

Mixx

Mixx I don't think this is true at all.Years ago I met a guy who is born and bred American who claimed to own Irish Citizenship,and was living in Dublin.You should check it ou with the Spanish Consulate in Florida.

Post: #7

(06-26-2011 10:43 PM)MiXX Wrote:  Does the US allow dual citizenship when you are born in the US and not through Naturalization?

I was told US dies not allow dual citizenship; .....
Mixx

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afroyim_v._Rusk

Mixx;
Supreme Court 1967 above reversed their own earlier decision
(by my reading, not a lawyer's), they ruled that there is no provision in Constitution for revoking citizenship. So if you're born here- you've got it because no law can supersede the Constitution's mandate of "Born here, Citizen here" unless there is an amendment to that Constitution.

So you're allowed to go somewhere else and get their citizenship too, if they'll let you, and the United States of Bush, Goldman & Sachs can wave their vampire squid tentacles in frustration, but essentially can't do much.

Oh, those silly EU contries have universal health care for all ages, too; so if you're contemplating early retirement..... If socialism is so bad, why does Sweden have a balanced budget? :
http://www.reuters.com/article/2010/08/3...5220100831

Allow me to answer my own question: Those giant vampire squids eat a LOT. Of blood.

The only drawbacks I know of are:

1) if you are of draftable age.

2) The US Gubmint CAN exclude you from getting military jobs, and contractor jobs related to national security. I know as a health care professional I can't work for the Army as a civilian employee without giving up my second passport.

3) If you are living THERE and make huge bux (200k+) you might be taxed by both US and EU? I have no such worries and don't know.

Gee, how disappointing, I was really excited to come out of retirement to start showing up on a military base 8 AM five days a week.

Post: #8

Ha! Well, the only one i need to concern with is ítem 3 for income taxes.

It would suck for EU & USA to perform some sandwich action on me for my taxes.

I'll get with an immigration Atty on this. Thx!

Post: #9

If you like mountains and want to live well off of $1600/month, I suggest Slovakia or Southern Poland. The Tatra mountains are the Alps of Eastern Europe, with very good skiing and summer-time mountain activities. Bratislava isn't the most glamorous city on the planet but it's comfortable and inexpensive. Krakow is a very nice city but $1600/month won't go as far there.

Post: #10

(06-27-2011 12:38 PM)Peoloom Wrote:  Bratislava isn't the most glamorous city on the planet but it's comfortable and inexpensive. Krakow is a very nice city but $1600/month won't go as far there.

Thanks Peoloom, less glamorous=nothing to do but fcuk, which I hope translates into higher % willing women. Unless the Catholicism there is real.

I really only need two, a wife and a crazy young mistress.

Post: #11

I would just marry a crazy, young wife and have a Milf mistress

Mixx

Post: #12

(06-27-2011 02:28 PM)MiXX Wrote:  I would just marry a crazy, young wife and have a Milf mistress

Mixx

That might be a more optimal arrangement for hanging on to both.
The young wife might be more proud of her Alpha husband and likely to stick around. You can always get an amiable used MILF.

Post: #13

(06-26-2011 10:43 PM)MiXX Wrote:  Does the US allow dual citizenship when you are born in the US and not through Naturalization?

Yes. In some cases it is even inevitable - for example, both of my sons are citizens of three countries right now, and they were born in US.

Read this, he did a very good analysis..

Quote:I was told US dies not allow dual citizenship; unless you were born outside US and naturalized as a US citizen.
In that case, I can get a EU passport too, both grandparents born in Spain.

You shall have no issues with US, but check Spanish laws too. For example, recent change in Russian law states that you must renounce all other citizenships to acquire a Russian one, and if you failed to do so, this is a ground to terminate your Russian citizenship. If Spain has something like that, you may not be able to get around it.

Post: #14

Your tax issues just got a little more complicated.
For example, the IRS wants you to disclose any foreign bank account - and I imagine you will open one in your chosen country of residence. They are also trying to get foreign banks to disclose info to the IRS, so they can tax any income you earn there (as a IS citizen, you are taxed on your worldwide income, with some exclusions available, of course).

Post: #15

(06-26-2011 10:25 PM)iknowexactly Wrote:  I hold stocks conservatively and sell options against them, if you're not familiar with it my particular racket is called "covered calls." Easy to search for.
You SELL stock options to the gamblers while owning stocks of huge corporations it would take WW3 to bring down . It's like being the
"house", you don't make killings, but you usually win; although if a stock leaps 10% in a week you don't get all of that, the gamblers get most.
You only need about 30k to make $200 per week.

Chevron, for instance, has offices in I think over 170 countries. It's probably more powerful than most countries, except for maybe USA, Japan, China, and Brazil.

Sure it's _possible_ Chevron's stock might lose 80%, but if THAT happens I'm going to have more serious problems to deal with like worldwide famine and chaos.

Advice to all: be very careful with the above strategy. If it was that easy, do you think some computer running out of Goldman Sachs' basement would not take advantage and trade it out nano-seconds before you?

I have to say your success with it may have been due to oil rising from $75 to $120 over the last year (even though it fell somewhat recently). This in no way guarantees you will still be pulling income from Covered Calls (CC's) next year, too. Actually, you might, but it may be more than offset from the stock price going back down if oil goes back to where it was last summer.

I actually went to the trouble of pulling out the historical CVX prices for each options expiration day over the last year (3rd Friday of each month). Historical option premiums are not available, unfortunately, but I approximated them to equal 2% of the stock price for a pretty close out-of-the-money call ($1) because this is what they are currently going for.
So here is your stock price, your received premium from the sold calls, and your cost to "roll them up" if they expire in-the-money. Of course, you don't have to roll them - you can just surrender your stock instead, but then you'd have to seek another investment and buy in it anyway. So might as well roll them.
Here we go:

Month Close Roll-up Premium Total
5/2010 74.48 1.4896 1.4896
6/2010 75.52 -0.04 1.5104 1.4704
7/2010 71.5 0 1.43 1.43
8/2010 75.05 -2.55 1.501 -1.049
9/2010 78.46 -2.41 1.5692 -0.8408
10/2010 83.61 -4.15 1.6722 -2.4778
11/2010 83.94 0 1.6788 1.6788
12/2010 88.49 -3.5 1.7698 -1.7802
1/2011 93.78 -4.2 1.8756 -2.4144
2/2011 98.72 -3.94 1.9744 -1.9656
3/2011 102.8 -3.08 2.056 -1.024
4/2012 106.24 -2.44 2.1248 -0.3152
5/2012 102.57 0 0
Total: -5.7982

So your total from the whole thing would be a negative ($5.7982) per each CVX share bought. Whereas if you just bought it and held, you would be up $27 or so.
You may say you don't need to sell just $1 out-of-the-money calls and may go $5 or $10 instead - but then your income would be very small. For example, CVX is now at $98.90 and a July $105 call ($6 out-of-the-money) goes for $0.22 - so on your 30k investment you would only make $150 this month, or about $50 per week not $200! (about 3 weeks remain till OpEx).

This is not to say there is no money to be made in options trading - rather, a warning to all those who think they can buy a How-to-make-money-in-options book at Barnes & Noble and start rolling in dough the next day.

Post: #16

Exactly what I was thinking as easy $10,000 a year on a $30,000 investment. Seems a little unlikely especially on the stock market.

Post: #17

I would love to have an American Green Card in addition to my EU passport , but the problem is that the only way for me to get one...is marrying an American Woman!!

Post: #18

[quote='K-man' pid='68901' dateline='1309250733']
Your tax issues just got a little more complicated.
For example, the IRS wants you to disclose any foreign bank account - and I imagine you will open one in your chosen country of residence.

Only if the account balance exceeds $10,000.

[quote]
They are also trying to get foreign banks to disclose info to the IRS, so they can tax any income you earn there (as a IS citizen, you are taxed on your worldwide income, with some exclusions available, of course).
[/quote]

I actually wonder if you open the account using your EU passport and never mention to the bank you have also the US citizenship (and most banks don't even ask), how would they provide the information about you to IRS?

Post: #19

(06-28-2011 11:23 AM)Mr.GM Wrote:  I would love to have an American Green Card in addition to my EU passport , but the problem is that the only way for me to get one...is marrying an American Woman!!

There are more than 20 ways to get a Green Card, marriage is just one of them. Truth to be told, vast majority of those twenty won't ever apply to you, but it still leaves you with:

- Employment-based Green Card;
- Green Card via Diversity Lottery (i.e. "Green Card Lottery");
- Investment-based Green Card;

Read that.

Post: #20

(06-28-2011 04:58 PM)oldnemesis Wrote:  

(06-28-2011 11:23 AM)Mr.GM Wrote:  I would love to have an American Green Card in addition to my EU passport , but the problem is that the only way for me to get one...is marrying an American Woman!!

There are more than 20 ways to get a Green Card, marriage is just one of them. Truth to be told, vast majority of those twenty won't ever apply to you, but it still leaves you with:

- Employment-based Green Card;
- Green Card via Diversity Lottery (i.e. "Green Card Lottery");
- Investment-based Green Card;

Read that.

A lot of Indians get company sponsorship with an H1-B Visa, and when they get their green cards, they return to India and request more $$$:

1. They now have a US Green Card
2. They have been trained in their technology fields by competent Americans.

So, if technology is your thing, getting an H1 may be something for you to explore.


Mixx

Post: #21

(06-28-2011 05:15 PM)MiXX Wrote:  

(06-28-2011 04:58 PM)oldnemesis Wrote:  

(06-28-2011 11:23 AM)Mr.GM Wrote:  I would love to have an American Green Card in addition to my EU passport , but the problem is that the only way for me to get one...is marrying an American Woman!!

There are more than 20 ways to get a Green Card, marriage is just one of them. Truth to be told, vast majority of those twenty won't ever apply to you, but it still leaves you with:

- Employment-based Green Card;
- Green Card via Diversity Lottery (i.e. "Green Card Lottery");
- Investment-based Green Card;

Read that.

A lot of Indians get company sponsorship with an H1-B Visa, and when they get their green cards, they return to India and request more $$$:

1. They now have a US Green Card
2. They have been trained in their technology fields by competent Americans.

So, if technology is your thing, getting an H1 may be something for you to explore.


Mixx

I thought MrGm was Brazilian bro.

Post: #22

(06-28-2011 05:35 PM)Geronimo Wrote:  

(06-28-2011 05:15 PM)MiXX Wrote:  

(06-28-2011 04:58 PM)oldnemesis Wrote:  

(06-28-2011 11:23 AM)Mr.GM Wrote:  I would love to have an American Green Card in addition to my EU passport , but the problem is that the only way for me to get one...is marrying an American Woman!!

There are more than 20 ways to get a Green Card, marriage is just one of them. Truth to be told, vast majority of those twenty won't ever apply to you, but it still leaves you with:

- Employment-based Green Card;
- Green Card via Diversity Lottery (i.e. "Green Card Lottery");
- Investment-based Green Card;

Read that.

A lot of Indians get company sponsorship with an H1-B Visa, and when they get their green cards, they return to India and request more $$$:

1. They now have a US Green Card
2. They have been trained in their technology fields by competent Americans.

So, if technology is your thing, getting an H1 may be something for you to explore.


Mixx

I thought MrGm was Brazilian bro.

He is, but I was saying that Indians I have personally met have received Green cards through H1 sponsorship...sorry for the confusion.


Mixx

Post: #23

(06-28-2011 05:29 AM)K-man Wrote:  Advice to all: be very careful with the above strategy. If it was that easy, do you think some computer running out of Goldman Sachs' basement would not take advantage and trade it out nano-seconds before you?

This is not to say there is no money to be made in options trading - rather, a warning to all those who think they can buy a How-to-make-money-in-options book at Barnes & Noble and start rolling in dough the next day.

k-man is absolutely right and probably knows more about this than I do. However, I do see a solution to avoid buying back calls that have gone way up--if you go far enough out in time; i've generally been able to "roll out" to out of the money calls at breakeven cost, the negative being I might have an option that's 3-4 month's duration. As far as Goldman Sachs, I think they have ways to steal that offer a far, far greater return on capital than CC.

My approach is based on largely not caring if the stock goes down-- which makes sense only if you are dealing with huge, powerful companies which are extremely unlikely to disappear. (If the stock goes down you keep all the call premium.) Tech companies in particular are vulnerable to game-changing ideas
which can kill them quick-- (how yahoo lost to google.)

Here's a chart of IBM, a computer company that didn't get destroyed; you can adjust the chart it so it goes back to the 1970's-- IBM, dominated computers in the 60's and 70's, but totally went up the wrong path in the 80's ( got behind in the microcomputer revolution) and their stock went way down, something like to 25% of its former value.

http://www.google.com/finance?q=ibm

But since 1995 it went up something like 1000% again.

Other companies like Digital Equipment Corporation DID disappear or shrink I think, but large commodity companies have huge, huge barriers to entry in their markets and are unlikely to get taken out like DEC did.

Can you imagine the resources it would take to compete with Chevron? To START something able to do that?

No Sergey Brin, is going to -with the force of his imagination- start pulling oil out of the ground at 1/10 the cost of Chevron. It seems a physical impossibility.

So with IBM, if they had covered calls, you could have started selling covered calls in 1980, and if you had the stomach to ignore the stock price, done that for the last 30 years and used it as income.

Chevron or its ilk will undoubtedly go down as oil has been hyped by speculators recently. But unless the world ends, or someone discovers a substitute for oil, it wlll probably go up again.

These giant companies aren't some kind of friendly citizens that play fair, they are the evil bastards that rule the world.

They have almost literally unlimited funds to bribe, blackmail, buy-and-bury competing technology, buy out competition, assassinate, and do whatever else they feel like to make money.

My view is that what the wealthy of the world want to happen, will happen. Everything in almost every economy is set up for their benefit, safety and profit.
They RUN the economy. They OWN the economy.

The wealthy want blue chip stocks to survive. Where do they keep their money?

You can't plan for every eventuality. But taking the 3% a year Treasury bonds offer when inflation is 10% seems to be accepting defeat, means continuing to WORK. If there's an event like the Russian Revolution, only hidden gold will save some of your wealth, but I'm not planning for this kind of black swan.

The rich don't want real chaos to happen, and for most of history, it seems the rich get what they want. Not always, but the great majority of the time.

People think about things like the fall of Rome ending their luxurious
lifestyles, but these things took hundreds of years I believe, like America is imploding now, but it takes decades more before, say, China owns 40% of the real estate in the USA.

My limited life span necessitates me planning for the next 30 years, not all the possible events of the next 300.

Post: #24

I prefer Exxon than Chevron...

Post: #25

Exxon or Chevron, anything may happen to them at any time - look at BP - a company of the same magnitude which saw its stock price plummet 50% in two weeks, just because of one well disaster in the Gulf.

That's why you should diversify, and you can't do that with $30k (unless you buy a mutual fund) - otherwise the commissions will kill you.

And a quick summary of what may happen when you sell covered call options - 3 scenarios basically:
- stock price goes up: well, tough luck because it will get called from you and you won't get the upside
- stock price goes down: even tougher luck, you are now stuck with the loss
- stock price stays the same: this is good for you, as you get to keep the premium from the options you sold, but it can only stay the same for a month or two. No stock price stays the same forever - otherwise it would be called a T-bill and would be paying you a 3% return.

But let's not hijack the thread, which was about dual EU/US passports. This is just a side warning to those looking to make quick bucks on the stock market.