This article is for general information purposes only and is not intended as specific tax advice. Please consult your tax advisor for advice relevant to your situation.

As year-end 1099 forms from U.S. banks and brokerages start to roll in, many Americans living overseas are beginning to collect the various documents needed to file their 2011 U.S. taxes. Since there's a number of sometimes obscure U.S. tax forms that U.S. citizens living overseas are required to file, we've provided an updated checklist below to help you keep track of them. Please note that using some of the following forms may help you to shield some of your foreign income from U.S. tax (although unfortunately U.S. citizens cannot "opt-out" of filing or paying U.S. federal income tax even if they're legally resident in another country). This list should be used as a starting point only. More detail on expat filing as well as each form can be found on the IRS website: www.irs.gov.

This article was provided by the CFA Institute about the importance of a CFA^® Charterholder. 

Successful investors recognize the importance of education and knowledge when it comes to managing financial assets. But while they may spend countless hours learning about markets, securities, and associated risks, investors often overlook the qualifications of the professionals whom they hire to manage their money.

There's no shortage of financial blogs, forums, and websites on the net these days. Well-known sites such as Yahoo! Finance, The Street, Smart Money, Bloomberg, Seeking Alpha, and Forbes are great for general audiences, although they don't necessarily focus on the specific financial issues that expatriates face. Many other financial sites target a strictly domestic audience. For those looking for financial and investment information from an expat perspective, we've compiled the following list of useful sites that you may not see in the usual "top financial website" lists.

This article is for general information purposes only and is not intended as specific tax advice. Please consult your tax advisor for advice relevant to your situation.

For expats who have been anticipating the implementation of the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) with increasing trepidation, the IRS recently delivered some good news to ring in the New Year. The minimum threshold values for foreign assets that trigger the requirement to file the Statement of Specified Foreign Financial Assets or Form 8938 have been raised significantly for both resident and non-resident American citizens. The upshot is that many expat Americans who fall below the threshold amounts will not be required to file Form 8938.