CRD VI Third-Country Banks: Non-EU Accounts After 2027

Status as of 15 October 2026: based on Article 21c of Directive 2013/36/EU as inserted by Directive (EU) 2024/1619 (CRD VI), recitals 5 and 6 of that directive, the European Banking Authority's report under Article 21c(6), the German transposing act (BRUBEG, Federal Law Gazette 2026 I No. 81) and sections 53c and 64c of the German Banking Act, the Luxembourg act of 5 May 2026, the Irish S.I. No. 326 of 2026, and the published Cypriot and Romanian bills. National laws are still moving. We will update this guide when they do.

In 88 days, on 11 January 2027, a quiet rule in European banking law starts to bite. It does not ban you from having a bank account in Switzerland, Dubai, Singapore or Georgia. It does something narrower and, for many people, more annoying: it tells the bank outside the EU that it may no longer serve EU residents from abroad, unless it opens an authorised branch inside the EU or a narrow exception applies.

The internet has turned this into two opposite stories. One says the EU is confiscating your foreign accounts. The other says nothing changes if you use the right trick. Both are wrong. This guide explains what Article 21c of the Capital Requirements Directive actually requires, what it leaves alone, which date matters for your existing account, and why a non-EU account is easiest to keep or open when it fits a real residence or business link outside the EU. At the end we compare it honestly with the option many EU founders already use: a Cyprus residence with an EU bank.

The short version

The rule targets the bank, not you. Article 21c is addressed to banks and other undertakings established outside the EU. It does not make it illegal for an EU resident to hold a foreign account, and it does not change your tax reporting.
Three services are covered. Taking deposits, lending, and sureties or commitments given on your behalf. These are the "core banking services".
Two dates matter. Contracts concluded before 11 July 2026 keep their protection unless materially changed. From 11 January 2027 the branch requirement applies.
Reverse solicitation survives, narrowly. If you approach the bank entirely on your own initiative, the bank may still serve you. Regulators read that exception strictly.
The clean path is a real link. A genuine residence or business outside the EU makes a non-EU account straightforward. For EU-based founders, an EU bank, often in Cyprus, is usually the cleaner tool.

What Article 21c actually says

CRD VI is the sixth version of the EU's Capital Requirements Directive. It was published in the Official Journal on 19 June 2024 as Directive (EU) 2024/1619 and amends the 2013 directive. Most of it concerns the capital, governance and supervision of EU banks. Article 21c is different: it deals with banks and similar firms established outside the EU, which EU law calls third-country undertakings.

Before CRD VI, each member state decided for itself whether a foreign bank could serve its residents across the border. Some, like Germany, already required a licence for active cross-border business. Others were relaxed. Article 21c replaces that patchwork with one baseline across the Union. In plain words, and in the wording our legal reviewer has cleared for this series:

From 11 January 2027, banks outside the EU generally need an authorised EU branch to provide core banking services (deposits, lending, guarantees) to EU residents. Contracts concluded before 11 July 2026 stay protected unless materially changed; anything signed after that date has no such protection. Reverse solicitation remains, but only where you approach the bank on your own exclusive initiative, and it is read narrowly. Transposition is uneven across member states; check your state.

Three details sit behind that summary. First, the bank may instead serve the EU through a subsidiary, which is then an EU bank in its own right, licensed and supervised here. Second, the requirement is set "in that member state": a branch authorised in one member state does not automatically let a non-EU bank serve residents of every other member state, because third-country branches do not passport like EU banks. Third, the directive gives member states until 10 January 2026 to transpose it, but the branch rule in Article 21c applies only from 11 January 2027. That gap is why you are reading about it now.

The three core services, and what sits outside them

Article 21c covers the activities in points 1, 2 and 6 of Annex I to the directive. In everyday terms:

Deposits and other repayable funds. Your current account, savings account, term deposit. For this service, the rule catches any undertaking in a third country, not only banks.
Lending. Consumer credit, mortgages, Lombard loans against a portfolio, overdrafts, trade finance. Here the rule catches undertakings that would count as credit institutions if they were established in the EU.
Sureties and commitments. Letters of credit, performance bonds and similar undertakings a bank gives on your behalf (point 6 of Annex I).

Several things sit outside Article 21c, at least partly:

Investment services. Brokerage, portfolio management and investment advice fall under the MiFID II framework. Article 21c(4) carves them out, together with ancillary services such as cash held or credit granted for the purpose of an investment service. A non-EU broker serving you is governed by the separate MiFID rules and national regimes, not by this branch requirement. That is a different question, with its own answers in each member state.
Services to banks and within a group. A non-EU bank may still lend to an EU credit institution, or provide services to members of its own group. These exceptions matter to treasuries, not to private clients.
Services that are not core banking. Pure payment or currency services without a deposit or loan behind them are not on the list. In practice, almost every account you would want to keep involves a deposit, so do not build your plan on this.

The European Banking Authority confirmed in its 2025 report that natural persons fall within the scope of Article 21c, just as companies do. There is no private-client exception.

Two dates: 11 July 2026 and 11 January 2027

The most practical question for anyone who already holds a non-EU account is which side of 11 July 2026 the contract sits on.

Article 21c(5) lets member states preserve clients' acquired rights under contracts entered into before that date. Recital 6 of CRD VI says such measures exist only to ease the transition and should be "narrowly framed to avoid instances of circumvention". The protection works contract by contract, not client by client. A Swiss savings account you opened in 2019 is protected. A new mortgage with the same bank, signed in September 2026, is not.

The difficult word is "materially". The directive does not define when an amended contract becomes a new one. Market associations and law firms have started to list the likely triggers, and the pattern is intuitive:

Probably harmless: corrections, technical updates, a new card on the same account, changes the bank makes to everyone's terms, economically immaterial amendments.
Probably a new contract: a higher credit limit, a longer term, a new loan or credit line, a new type of product, a restructuring, or a change that shifts the economics of the deal.

For a simple deposit account, the safest course is dull: leave it as it is, keep the original contract and onboarding papers, and avoid adding new lending products from that bank after 11 July 2026 unless the bank confirms in writing how it treats them. Each member state has transposed this protection in its own words, so the bank's legal team will read your contract through the law of your state.

From 11 January 2027 the branch requirement applies to everything that is not protected or exempt. A bank without an EU branch that keeps serving unprotected EU clients risks sanctions from the supervisor in that member state. That is why the realistic consequence for many clients is not a fine on them but a letter from the bank.

Reverse solicitation, read narrowly

Reverse solicitation is the exception everyone hopes to use. It applies where an EU client or counterparty approaches the non-EU bank on its own exclusive initiative. The bank may then provide the service requested, plus services that are necessary for or closely related to it, including later ones.

The limits are written into the text:

No marketing at all. If the bank, a company of its group, an agent or any person acting for it solicited you, the exception does not apply. A webinar, an introducer, a relationship manager visiting your city, a targeted advert: any of these can break it.
Only the category you asked for. Asking for a deposit account does not open the door for the bank to offer you a mortgage, a credit card line or an investment mandate. A new category means a new solicitation question.
Evidence matters. Banks will want proof that you came to them. Expect forms in which you confirm, under your signature, that you approached them without solicitation. Sign only what is true.

The EBA describes marketing as incompatible with reverse solicitation, and law firms report that supervisors intend to read it strictly. A business model built on thousands of EU clients who all claim to have found the bank by themselves will not survive a supervisor's look. Banks know this, and many will simply decline new EU residents instead of carrying the risk.

So reverse solicitation is real, but it is a door you can walk through once, quietly, on your own feet. It is not a service anyone can sell you. If someone acting for the bank offers to arrange a reverse-solicited account, that offer is itself solicitation.

Who is caught: clients established or situated in the EU

The rule protects clients "established or situated" in a member state. For a company, that points to where it is established. For an individual, it points to where you actually live. Nationality does not matter: a German citizen living in Dubai is not an EU client for this purpose, and a Brazilian citizen living in Lisbon is.

This has a consequence that surprises many readers. Cyprus is in the EU. If you move from Germany or Romania to Cyprus, you are still an EU resident for Article 21c, and a non-EU bank needs a branch in Cyprus, an exemption or a protected contract to serve you. Cyprus solves tax questions and gives you EU banking; it does not take you outside CRD VI.

For companies, the directive asks where the company is established; where it is actually run decides its tax residence and what a bank will see. A company incorporated outside the EU, with real management, staff or clients there, is a different client from a company incorporated abroad but run from a kitchen table in Munich. The second case raises the same management-and-control questions we discuss in our guide to international company structures, and a bank will see them too.

What about people with two homes? Directive text does not define "situated" in detail, and a bank will rely on your declared residence and its own KYC file. If you are tax resident in Cyprus and also hold a residence card in the UAE, a bank may well treat you as an EU client. Tell the bank the truth about where you live. It will find out anyway through your tax self-certification, your address documents and the Common Reporting Standard.

The rule targets the bank, not you

It helps to say clearly what Article 21c does not do.

It does not make it unlawful for you to hold a non-EU account, open one on a trip, or keep money abroad.
It does not oblige you to close accounts.
It does not create a new tax or a new reporting duty for you. Your foreign accounts were already reported under the Common Reporting Standard where the country participates, and your income is taxed in your country of residence as before.
It does not stop you from sending money from an EU bank to your own account abroad.

What it does is raise the cost and legal risk for a non-EU bank that serves EU residents without a branch. Banks respond to cost and risk. Some will open or expand EU branches. Some will keep protected clients and stop onboarding new EU residents. Some will exit entire client groups, a pattern bankers call de-risking. You may receive a letter in late 2026 or early 2027 asking you to confirm your residence or announcing the end of the relationship.

Your job is not to outwit the rule. Your job is to be the kind of client a bank can still lawfully keep.

Transposition: uneven, so check your state

A directive does not apply directly. Each member state has to write it into national law, and the deadline was 10 January 2026. Many states missed it. As of October 2026, the picture we could verify is:

Germany: transposed by the BRUBEG act of 25 March 2026, published in the Federal Law Gazette on 30 March 2026. The new rules for third-country branches sit in sections 53c to 53cq of the Banking Act and apply from 11 January 2027.
Luxembourg: transposed by the act of 5 May 2026. Commentary to the act suggests that purely remote activity with no relevant nexus to Luxembourg may fall outside the branch requirement, a national reading worth noting.
Ireland: transposed by S.I. No. 326 of 2026, signed on 10 July 2026, close to the directive's own text.
Cyprus: a bill amending the Business of Credit Institutions Law reached the House of Representatives on 9 July 2026. Check whether it has been adopted before relying on any Cypriot detail.
Romania: the Ministry of Finance published a draft law amending Emergency Ordinance 99/2006 in February 2026. Check whether it has been adopted, and its final form in the Official Gazette.

Member states may differ on territorial scope, the reach of the prohibition, the wording of the protection for old contracts and the reverse solicitation test. The practical rule: the law of the member state where you live decides how a bank must treat you. Check your state, or ask the bank which national rules it applies.

What to do with an account you already have

If you hold a non-EU account today and live in the EU, work through these cards before the end of the year:

Find your contract date. Dig out the account opening documents. If the relationship began before 11 July 2026, note it and keep the papers.
List every product. Deposit, card, credit line, Lombard loan, letter of credit, investment account. Each is its own contract question.
Freeze the shape. Avoid new loans, higher limits or new product types from that bank until you know how it treats them.
Ask the bank in writing. Ask whether it will have an EU branch or subsidiary from 11 January 2027 and how it will treat existing EU clients. A clear answer now beats a closure letter in January.
Keep an EU account ready. Make sure your salary, rent, taxes and business income can run through an EU bank if the foreign account is restricted.
Do not change your declared address. Telling a bank you live somewhere you do not is not a workaround. It is a false statement on a KYC file, and it can cost you the account and much more.

Opening a new non-EU account after 11 July 2026

For anyone who lives in the EU and wants a new account outside it, the window has narrowed. Without a protected contract, the bank needs an EU branch, a lawful exemption, or a genuine reverse solicitation. Many banks will prefer to say no.

The cases that still work well share one feature: the account fits a real life or business outside the EU.

You actually live there. If you have moved your residence to the UAE, Georgia, Paraguay or Serbia, you are no longer an EU client. A local bank serves a local resident, which is what banks are built for.
Your business is there. A company with real operations, staff, suppliers or clients in a non-EU country needs a local account, and the bank understands why. The client is the company, and its establishment is real.
You hold a real Plan B residence and spend real time there. Even if you also live in the EU, a residence permit, a lease and a local tax number make your file coherent. The bank still decides how to classify you, but you are not asking it to pretend.
You approach the bank yourself for one clear purpose. For example, a deposit account in a country where you own property, pay local costs and visit regularly. That is reverse solicitation in its natural form.

What does not work, and what we will never suggest: a borrowed address, a "flag" residence you never use, a nominee, a shell company with no life of its own, or a self-certification that does not match where you sleep. These are the quickest ways to lose an account and to create a tax and criminal problem in your real country of residence.

EMIs, brokers and fintech accounts

Many readers use fintech accounts rather than traditional banks. Here the key question is which legal entity your contract is with.

An EU-licensed entity (an e-money institution, payment institution or bank licensed in an EU member state) is not a third-country undertaking. Article 21c does not affect it.
A non-EU entity of the same brand may be. Several fintechs already moved EU clients to EU entities after Brexit. Check the name of the contracting company in your terms and conditions.
E-money and deposits are not the same in law. E-money institutions issue electronic money; they do not take deposits. Whether a non-EU fintech's product counts as taking repayable funds is a technical question for the provider's lawyers. Do not assume either way.
Brokers fall mainly under MiFID rules, as explained above. The cash in your brokerage account is usually ancillary to the investment service. Keep large idle balances in a bank where you understand the protection.

Cyprus banking: the EU option

For founders who move to Cyprus, banking is usually simpler than they fear, provided the file is coherent. Cyprus banks are EU banks: SEPA payments, IBANs in your own name, supervision under EU rules, and deposit protection up to EUR 100,000 per depositor per bank under the EU deposit protection directive. EU banks in other member states can also serve you without any branch question at all, because they passport across the Union.

What a Cyprus or EU bank wants is the same as anywhere: identity, a real address in your country of residence, a clear source of funds and a business that makes sense. We explain the process step by step in our guide to banking after you move abroad, and the order of the move in relocating to Cyprus. If you run a business, the account usually follows the Cyprus company formation and its real management on the island. If you qualify, the tax side is the Non-Dom regime, with 0% Special Defence Contribution on dividends and interest until you have been Cyprus resident for 17 of the last 20 years, plus the 2.65% GESY health contribution.

Two points are easy to miss. First, Cyprus residence must be real: many readers use the 60-day route, and its calendar has to be planned precisely, as we show in the Cyprus 60-day rule with a real calendar. Second, leaving your old country is a separate project with its own rules, covered in leaving a high-tax country for Cyprus. Neither is solved by a bank account.

Plan B residences that help non-EU banking

A Plan B residence is a lawful second residence outside the EU. It is not a way to hide from your bank or your tax office. It is a door you can use if you need it, and when you really use it, banking in that country becomes ordinary.

Georgia: banks used to foreign clients, a residence route for people of substantial means, and a tax residence route for high-net-worth individuals without a day threshold. Local banking follows local residence and a local tax number.
The UAE: strong banks, a residence visa through a company, employment or property, and a tax residence certificate that requires real presence. Banks there apply thorough KYC to newcomers.
Paraguay: an accessible residence and a territorial tax system, with a banking sector that is smaller and more conservative than many expect.
Serbia, Turkey, Mexico and Panama: real residence routes with local banks that serve residents. Each has its own presence rules.

How a Cyprus base and a Plan B fit together is set out in Cyprus as your EU base next to a Plan B. For holding structures, see asset protection and privacy.

Three worked cases (illustrative, not clients)

Case 1: the old Swiss account. Anna lives in Munich and has kept a Swiss savings account since 2019, with about EUR 80,000 on deposit. Her contract predates 11 July 2026, so it is protected unless materially changed. In 2027 her bank offers her a Lombard loan against her portfolio. That would be a new product and a new contract, outside the protection and probably outside reverse solicitation, because the bank proposed it. Her plan: keep the deposit, decline the loan, ask the bank in writing about its CRD VI approach, and keep a German account able to carry all her everyday finances. If the bank exits German clients, she moves the money home in an orderly way rather than in a panic.

Case 2: the founder moving to Cyprus. Mihai runs a software consultancy and moves from Romania to Cyprus in early 2027 under the 60-day route. He wants a bank account in Dubai "for diversification". As a Cyprus resident he is an EU client. A Dubai bank without an EU branch could serve him only on true reverse solicitation, and many will decline. His cleaner set-up: a Cyprus company account and a personal account with an EU bank for income and taxes, plus a second EU bank for redundancy. If he later builds real operations in the UAE, with a licence, an office and staff, a UAE company account becomes natural because the client is the UAE company.

Case 3: the real move outside the EU. Lukas, a German consultant, gives up his flat in Hamburg and moves with his family to Tbilisi, where the children go to school and he signs a long lease. He is now situated in Georgia, not in the EU, and Article 21c is not his concern when he opens a Georgian account. His concerns are different: his German tax exit, including the questions we cover in our article on leaving a high-tax country, and the KYC reviews his remaining German accounts will run once he declares a non-EU address.

Who a non-EU bank account does not fit

People who live in the EU and want a foreign account only because it feels safer, with no life or business attached to it.
Anyone tempted to give a bank an address where they do not live.
Founders who need daily SEPA payments, local cards and simple accounting. An EU bank does this better.
People who would rely on borrowing from a non-EU bank after 2027 while living in the EU. Lending is where the rule bites hardest.
Anyone unwilling to keep a clean paper trail on contract dates, residence and source of funds.

FAQ

Will my non-EU bank close my account on 11 January 2027?

Not automatically. Contracts concluded before 11 July 2026 stay protected unless materially changed. Whether your bank keeps you is its decision. Some banks will keep protected clients; others will exit EU residents. Ask your bank in writing now.

Is it illegal for me, as an EU resident, to have a bank account in Switzerland or Dubai?

No. Article 21c places the obligation on the bank, not on you. You must still declare income and accounts as your country requires, exactly as before.

Can I open a new non-EU account by approaching the bank myself?

Possibly, under reverse solicitation, if the initiative is genuinely and exclusively yours and you ask only for the product you need. It is read narrowly, and many banks will decline to rely on it.

Does moving to Cyprus take me outside CRD VI?

No. Cyprus is an EU member state. A Cyprus resident is an EU client. Cyprus does give you access to EU banks, which is the simpler route for most founders.

Are fintech and broker accounts affected?

EU-licensed fintechs are not third-country undertakings and are not affected. Investment services are carved out to the MiFID framework. Check the legal entity named in your contract.

How it compares with Cyprus, and when it beats Cyprus

For most EU founders the honest comparison looks like this:

Legal certainty: an EU bank, including a Cyprus bank, is untouched by Article 21c. A non-EU bank serving an EU resident depends on a branch, a protected contract or a narrow exception.
Daily operations: an EU bank gives you SEPA, local cards and EUR accounts that accountants and tax offices know. A non-EU account adds currency, cost and paperwork.
Protection: EU deposits enjoy EU deposit protection up to EUR 100,000 per depositor per bank. Outside the EU, protection depends on local law.
Diversification: a non-EU account in a country where you really live or do business spreads jurisdictional risk. That is its real value.

A non-EU bank beats a Cyprus-only set-up in three situations: when you genuinely live outside the EU for most of the year; when your business has real operations, clients or suppliers outside the EU; and when you hold a protected pre-July-2026 contract worth keeping alongside your EU accounts. In every other case, start with a coherent Cyprus residence and an EU bank, then add a non-EU account when your life or business gives it a reason to exist. Everything else in this series is in our blog.

Sources

Directive (EU) 2024/1619 (CRD VI), EUR-Lex: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/dir/2024/1619/oj
Directive 2013/36/EU (CRD), consolidated, EUR-Lex: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/dir/2013/36/oj
EBA, Report under Article 21c(6) CRD VI (2025): https://www.eba.europa.eu/sites/default/files/2025-07/761117e3-bdb6-473b-b0d5-964bccd5f410/Report%20provision%20of%20services%20from%203rd%20countries.pdf
Federal Law Gazette, BRUBEG, BGBl. 2026 I No. 81: https://www.recht.bund.de/bgbl/1/2026/81/VO.html
German Banking Act, section 53c: https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/kredwg/__53c.html
German Banking Act, section 64c: https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/kredwg/__64c.html
A&O Shearman, Luxembourg CRD VI transposition completed: https://www.aoshearman.com/en/insights/luxembourg-crd-vi-transposition-is-completed
William Fry, CRD VI third-country branch regime transposed in Ireland: https://www.williamfry.com/knowledge/crd-vi-third-country-branch-regime-transposed-in-ireland/
Loan Market Association, Article 21c tracker (15 July 2026): https://www.lma.eu.com/download?p=5836555300-67193
Loan Market Association, Article 21c corporate lending paper: https://www.lma.eu.com/application/files/6317/7823/9770/Article_21c_Corp_Lending_paper_-_Final.pdf
Romanian Ministry of Finance, draft law amending OUG 99/2006 (February 2026): https://mfinante.gov.ro/static/10/Mfp/transparenta/EMproiectLegemodifOUG99_09022026.pdf
Central Bank of Cyprus, Business of Credit Institutions Law: https://www.centralbank.cy/en/legal-framework/licensing-supervision/legislation/legislation-on-banks/the-business-of-credit-institutions-law
Directive 2014/49/EU on deposit protection schemes, EUR-Lex: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/dir/2014/49/oj
OECD, Common Reporting Standard: https://www.oecd.org/tax/automatic-exchange/common-reporting-standard/

If you would like a second pair of eyes on your own banking set-up, you can write to us.

General information, not legal, tax or banking advice. The law of your member state and your bank's own policy decide your case.

Cover photo: DXR, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.