Bridging the Pacific: Crafting Tax-Smart Aussie Estates for US Beneficiaries

Host: Ashley S. Murphy, CFP® GFP Fellow

Tri-citizen of the US, Australia and the UK & Principal of Areté Wealth Strategists Australia, a financial planning firm based in the US, whose expat clients constitute 90% of its portfolio. More Info

At Arete Wealth Strategists Australia, Ashley works with clients to bring strategy, structure, clarity, confidence and compliance to their global financial lives and keep it that way.

Founded In 2013, Arete Wealth Strategists Australia is an SEC-registered, fee-only financial planning and investment management firm for Australian/American expatriates located in the United States and Australia.

As of 2021, Ashley and his team have grown the firm from start-up in 2013 to 63 client households with $63M in Assets Under Management while experiencing an impressive 400% growth in Assets Under Management in the past 3 years.

Ashley is a tri-citizen of the USA, Australia and the UK. From 2014 - 2017, Ashley taught in the CFP programs at UC Berkeley Extension and Golden Gate University. He was formerly a Knowledge Circle host for the International and Cross-Border Knowledge Circle with the Financial Planning Association (2017 - 2019), and a regular conference speaker. He holds a Graduate Diploma in Financial Planning in Australia making him one of the only financial advisors qualified in both countries. Ashley has been quoted in the Wall Street Journal and profiled in Financial Advisor Magazine. He places a strong emphasis on learning and typically achieves a multiple of the required Continuing Education (CE) credit for his designations.

Ashley’s undergraduate studies at the University of Queensland (Brisbane, Australia) were in Business Management and Management Information Systems. Ashley has long felt a passion for financial planning and investment management. While completing his undergraduate studies, he founded an investment club and grew it to over 300 members.

In 2005, he ventured to the United States to pursue his dreams in the San Francisco Bay Area. Ashley worked for several large companies, including Visa, Babcock and Brown and VWR International as a corporate financial analyst.

Ashley began the transition to financial planning in 2008. In 2009 he completed the first level of the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) designation. In 2010, Ashley was named runner-up ‘Student of the Year’ in the UC Berkeley Extension’s Personal Financial Planning program and won a number of scholarships. In 2012, he obtained his Certified Financial Planner™ designation.

Ashley, his wife Eliza, daughters Elise & Jasmine maintain their residence in Minneapolis, MN but are living in Brisbane, MN through 2022. He enjoys cycling, reading and world travel. He is a futurist with interests in architecture, renewable energy and demographics.

Guest: Renuka Somers

Renuka Somers is a Tax, Trusts, and Estate Planning lawyer licensed in New York and Australia.
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Renuka Somers is the Principal and founder of Somers Tax Law, PLLC, a New York based law firm dedicated to assisting private individuals, privately held family businesses, and their advisers, resolve complex U.S.-Australian tax, trusts, structuring, and estate planning matters, and assisting with U.S.-international tax disclosure requirements and IRS tax remediation.

Prior to establishing Somers Tax Law, Renuka worked in large accounting and law firms in Australia, headed the U.S.-Australian tax practice for a Family Office advisory firm in the U.S., and worked in Tax Controversy and Estate Planning at a law firm in the Washington D.C. area.

Renuka has written extensively on U.S. and Australian domestic and cross-border tax, trusts, structuring, and estate planning matters. She has been published in the American Bar Association’s Tax Times, and The Tax Institute’s Taxation in Australia, and Tax Specialist journals. She has presented on these topics for The Tax Institute, and the Leo Cussen Institute, in Australia, and the Association of Practicing Certified Public Accountants, in the United States.