US accounts checker

The US side: the FBAR

A US person, citizen or resident, files an FBAR if they have a financial interest in, or signature authority over, at least one financial account located outside the United States and the aggregate value of those foreign accounts exceeded $10,000 at any time during the calendar year.¹

Generally, an account at a financial institution located outside the United States is a foreign financial account. The IRS lists accounts you do not report, among them an IRA of which you are the owner or beneficiary and an account held in a retirement plan in which you participate.¹

The FBAR is due on April 15 after the year reported, with an automatic extension to October 15. It is filed electronically with FinCEN, not with your federal tax return.¹

The French side: accounts abroad

A person domiciled in France must declare to the tax administration the accounts held abroad that were opened, held, used or closed during the tax year, whether they are held with a bank or with any financial service provider. Foreign digital-asset accounts and life insurance contracts taken out abroad are covered too.²

The declaration goes in with the annual income tax return: you tick the matching box of the return and attach one declaration per account. For an online bank, the first letters of the IBAN give the country: a French IBAN starts with FR, and an account that does not must be declared as a foreign account every year.^{2, 3}

What this page does not settle

Whether a US firm keeps serving your account once your address is French is each firm's own policy, not a rule of either government. The checker's footer says its verdicts rest on firm policies as published plus reported client experience, and this page does not restate them.