CRS explained: what the automatic exchange means for your foreign account

Since 2017, over 120 countries have exchanged financial data automatically. If you hold an account in Spain, Singapore or Switzerland and are tax-resident in the UK or the Nordics, your tax authority knows about it without you having to report anything. The bank does it for you. That is the Common Reporting Standard (CRS).

What is the CRS?

The CRS is an international agreement, developed by the OECD, that obliges banks in member countries to report the account data of foreign clients to those clients' home countries. The goal: making tax evasion through foreign accounts harder.

Concretely, your bank reports each year to its local tax authority which foreign clients hold accounts there. The local authority forwards that data to each account holder's home country.

What is reported: name, address, tax identification number and date of birth of the account holder; the account number; the year-end balance; credits and distributions during the year.

What is not reported: individual transactions; purchase history; your communication with the bank.

The CRS is not a full download of your financial history. It is an annual snapshot: who holds what, where.

Which countries participate?

As of 2026, over 120 jurisdictions take part. Some important exceptions and special cases:

Non-CRS countries: North Macedonia, Gambia, Serbia, the Philippines.

CRS members with gaps between paper and practice: Georgia officially acceded in 2024, but implementation is patchy in practice; tax IDs are frequently not collected at account opening, so no usable automatic report can flow. Armenia shows the same constellation: officially acceded, but a practically effective data flow has not been observed to date. Neither changes your declaration duty; both mean the automatic pipeline is currently not working reliably.

Vanuatu has been a CRS member since 2018 and actively exchanges data, but remains interesting as a zero-tax jurisdiction with no income tax.

What does the CRS mean for me as an account holder?

First things first: a foreign account is legal. The duty to declare income from foreign accounts in your tax return existed in the UK and the Nordics long before the CRS. The CRS changes nothing about what you must declare; it only adds that the bank reports it automatically as well.

What the CRS changes is enforceability. Before the CRS, one could theoretically hold an account abroad and hope nobody found out. That is over. The CRS ensures the information flows automatically.

Whoever declares their foreign account correctly suffers no disadvantage from the CRS. Whoever has not declared it now has a problem.

Why do our clients still care about non-CRS jurisdictions?

The reasons are varied, and mostly not what one would assume.

Many clients are not looking for tax avoidance but for genuine data protection. They do not want their account data wandering through ten authorities before landing at their home tax office; every data point along that route is a potential risk point.

Others seek jurisdictions with more stable banking systems, better interest rates or specific account features, and it happens that some of those are outside the CRS.

And then there is the grey zone: Georgia and Armenia, both officially acceded, both with a practically ineffective data flow to date. That changes nothing about your declaration duty, but it means the automatic pipeline currently does not work reliably.

Frequently asked questions

Does the CRS mean my foreign account is illegal?

No. A foreign account is fully legal. The CRS only ensures the bank reports it automatically; the declaration duty existed before.

Which countries do not participate in the CRS?

As of 2026: North Macedonia, Gambia, Serbia, the Philippines. The USA participates in FATCA but not the CRS.

What exactly does the CRS report?

Name, address, tax ID and date of birth; account number; year-end balance; credits and distributions during the year. Not individual transactions.

Does a non-CRS account make my money tax-free?

No. The declaration duty in your tax return remains unchanged. Only the automatic pipeline is absent.

The CRS is no cause for panic, but it is a cause for clarity. Whoever manages their foreign account correctly has nothing to fear. Whoever thinks strategically weighs a jurisdiction's CRS status as one factor among many in choosing the right banking location.