The tax authorities of the city and canton of Lucerne have reason to be happy. Two other very wealthy Norwegians who moved to Switzerland chose the City of Lights as their new place of residence.
Jens Rugseth (60) told Norwegian business newspaper “Dagens Naeringsliv” a few days ago that he had an apartment in Lucerne. In the long term, he plans to move to a villa in the Lucerne region. Meanwhile, Rune Syversen (54) decided to do the same. This is reported by «Finansavisen». When asked by Blick, the Lucerne Immigration Office cannot confirm this for data protection reasons.
The biggest investors in the IT sector
who are both Rugseth and Syversen on business. Both own investment company Karbon Invest AS, one of the most important investment companies on the Oslo Stock Exchange. Through this company, they are the main shareholders of the IT company Crayon, which owns 48 million CHF worth of shares each. Syversen is also the CEO of this company, which has 55 offices worldwide and a total of 1600 employees. The two hold larger stakes in Sikri Group, Link Mobility, Cyviz and Techstep, particularly in the IT sector.
Both belong to the 400 richest Norwegians. Jens Rugseth made his first million selling Apple computers in the late 1980s; His fortune is currently around 2.35 billion Norwegian crowns (225 million Swiss francs). Syversen has assets of 1.4 billion crowns, or 134 million francs. But the fortunes of the two super-rich have drastically reduced during the pandemic.
The two are still enjoying a few splurges. Ship fanatic Rugseth is the owner of sailboat manufacturer Swan’s first motor yacht. The price of the 13-meter long motor yacht, which can sleep only two people, is 700,000 francs.
Back home to Norway after five years?
Both justified their moves with the increasing tax burden in Norway. The tax rate on unrealized gains was raised to a record 37.8 percent. The wealth tax on stocks rose nearly 70 percent in a year. The dividend tax was increased, as was the wealth tax rate.
This creates particular problems: It can cause difficulties for companies, as unrealized profits are often only on paper and are already taxed. Rugseth argues that companies sometimes need to take out loans, sell shares or use dividends to pay such taxes. None of this is an option in the current economic environment. That’s why Rugseth concludes: “I’m not interested in saving on the private wealth tax, there are cheaper places to do it than in Lucerne. It’s about not putting my companies, built over many years, into a financially unstable situation.”
Despite high tax increases, Norway has not yet dared to impose an “immigration tax for the super-rich”. Under previous Norwegian law, you do not have to pay taxes on unrealized profits if you take them abroad for at least five years. So five years living in Switzerland was enough and you will not be taxed on these earnings when you return to Norway. For example, if you have an unrealized profit of 100 million in five years, you have to surrender 38 million of that to the tax authorities in Norway. If you live in Switzerland, zero. This situation is changing with the new law proposal. Will this prevent wealthy Norwegians from evading taxes?
The immigration of super-rich Norwegians began with businessman and entrepreneur Kjell Inge Røkke (63). Moved from Oslo to Lugano TI. Since then, two dozen millionaires from the north have done the same.