Hi all,  my wife and I (soon to be divorced amicably) have an investment in Thailand that pays a regular income. After we divorce I intend to carry on with the investment while my wife plans to withdraw her half of the money. My wife seems to think that it may be illegal to earn money this way for a single farang and that I may need to set up a company with another Thai in order to continue receiving my regular income. Can anyone tell me if this is correct please ? Also could anyone tell me if I would need a specific type of visa ?

 

Thanks 

 

Carl 

Investment in what?

1 minute ago, FritsSikkink said:

Investment in what?

It’s to do with the distribution of lottery tickets 

1 minute ago, killblues said:

It’s to do with the distribution of lottery tickets 

I think you need a license for that

21 minutes ago, FritsSikkink said:

I think you need a license for that

I believe that it’s the company that we invested in that requires (has) the license , all that my wife and I do is invest money for the company to buy/sell the tickets on our behalf and they take a cut. 

36 minutes ago, killblues said:

I believe that it’s the company that we invested in that requires (has) the license , all that my wife and I do is invest money for the company to buy/sell the tickets on our behalf and they take a cut. 

This sounds strange:

"the company that we invested in" are you a share holder or did you give the company a loan?

"the company to buy/sell the tickets on our behalf" a company buys and sells for the company and his shareholders.

"they take a cut." the company gets the money and gives the shareholders dividend OR pays rent on a loan.

 

1 hour ago, FritsSikkink said:

This sounds strange:

"the company that we invested in" are you a share holder or did you give the company a loan?

"the company to buy/sell the tickets on our behalf" a company buys and sells for the company and his shareholders.

"they take a cut." the company gets the money and gives the shareholders dividend OR pays rent on a loan.

 

Apologies if my terminology confuses things. As you can probably tell I’m no business expert ! Basically we pay a certain amount of money to a lottery agent who uses that money to buy so many lottery tickets for each draw and sell them for us at a small profit on each ticket. The agent then takes a fee and we get the profit. We have a fixed term renewable contract and we can withdraw our initial payment amount at any time after a short notice period if we want to but obviously that would terminate the contract.

3 minutes ago, killblues said:

Apologies if my terminology confuses things. As you can probably tell I’m no business expert ! Basically we pay a certain amount of money to a lottery agent who uses that money to buy so many lottery tickets for each draw and sell them for us at a small profit on each ticket. The agent then takes a fee and we get the profit. We have a fixed term renewable contract and we can withdraw our initial payment amount at any time after a short notice period if we want to but obviously that would terminate the contract.

Are you certain about this, it sounds very much like a pyramid scheme?

25 minutes ago, nigelforbes said:

Are you certain about this, it sounds very much like a pyramid scheme?

My wife’s more clued in than me about it but I raised similar questions and she says it’s ok , we are aware of other people running similar schemes that are dodgy to say the least. 

47 minutes ago, killblues said:

Apologies if my terminology confuses things. As you can probably tell I’m no business expert ! Basically we pay a certain amount of money to a lottery agent who uses that money to buy so many lottery tickets for each draw and sell them for us at a small profit on each ticket. The agent then takes a fee and we get the profit. We have a fixed term renewable contract and we can withdraw our initial payment amount at any time after a short notice period if we want to but obviously that would terminate the contract.

Officially there are some headaches:

1. It is a business which requires work, work requires a work permit, a non-B visa and 4 Thai employees.
2. A business needs to be with a Thai partner who owns 51 percent of the business (not needed if you are from the USA)
3. Money lending is limited to certain businesses
4. I don't know if selling lottery tickets is allowed by foreigners 

2 minutes ago, FritsSikkink said:

Officially there are some headaches:

1. It is a business which requires work, work requires a work permit, a non-B visa and 4 Thai employees.
2. A business needs to be with a Thai partner who owns 51 percent of the business (not needed if you are from the USA)
3. Money lending is limited to certain businesses
4. I don't know if selling lottery tickets is allowed by foreigners 

Ok thanks for that. Hypothetically if I were to put the business in the name of a trusted Thai friend I’m guessing it would be ok other than possibly point 3. 

You did mention that you could pull your money out, thus terminating the contract. 

Unless this "investment is very profitable for you, why not just get out from under it, & release yourself from the "potentially" dodgy / questionable aspects?  

 

 

What you describe is not work and would not require a work permit to do so (why you would need a company etc). 

If you are comfortable with the risk profile etc you should be fine. Thats said if someone powerful wants to make something a problem, they usually can, but general legally speaking this is simple investment and investment returns. 

You may wish to consider if these domestic investment returns are being declared as taxable income (they are).