How I Set Up a Bank Account in Ireland

Seventeen minutes.

A surprisingly short amount of time to internationalize my financial life.

This goes back to early 2023. I was traveling through Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland for a story I was writing on off-season golf at some of the most revered courses in the game (if you’re a passionate golfer, huge discounts are available, if you don’t mind the possibility of a wee bit o’ weather).

Anywho… my last stop was The K Club, a course just to the west of Dublin that has hosted a variety of top-level tournaments, including the Ryder Cup.

Before I’d left home in Prague, where I was living at the time, I reached out to Allied Irish Bank, asking if AIB might allow me to open a local bank account as an American who doesn’t live in Ireland.

I was expecting a no.

I got a yes—from Chloe in the Clane branch telling me “we will need two forms of proof of address… we can use a utility bill, a bank statement, a letter from [the IRS] if you have something. They must be dated within the last six months.”

So, I made an appointment to visit Chloe in the Clane branch just before heading out for my meeting at The K Club.

I showed up at the appointed time.

Chloe took my passport, a bank statement, and a letter from the IRS, did what she needed to do with them, filled out all my info on the form on her computer screen… and I was out of the branch in 17 minutes, the owner of a new account at AIB.

A week later, my AIB debit card arrived in Prague.

Today, I use that account largely as a euro savings account (I also have my Irish phone plan—my primary phone number—linked to my AIB account so that I can autopay my monthly phone bill).

My desire for this account was simple: I wanted a way to keep some of my wealth outside of the US dollar and the US monetary system.

I simply don’t trust the dollar anymore.

I’m not being derogatory toward the dollar. And I’m not implying that it’s a bad currency.

But at the time I opened that account the dollar, as a matter of unimpeachable fact, was burdened by 1) an extreme amount of debt, and 2) an extreme amount of divisiveness among politicians, some of whom were—and still are—clearly willing to hold the dollar hostage in their negotiations to extract from the other party whatever concessions they’re chasing.

That was bad enough back then.

Today, the situation is far worse.

America’s debt accumulation is escalating at a torrid pace.

So far this year, the Federal government has overspent the budget by $1.31 trillion dollars. This time last year, the Capital Hill Clown Show had overspent by $1.06 trillion.

Yay for winning!

We also have a president who is telling the world openly that he wants a weaker dollar.

And we have presidential advisors penning treatises, or stating out loud on various media platforms, that the dollar’s role as reserve currency for the last 80 years needs to vamos because America can no longer afford the cost—namely a strong dollar that has eroded the country’s manufacturing base.

There’s this saying on Wall Street that you “never fight the Fed” because the Fed’s actions determine where asset prices go.

I’d say the same thing in this case, “Never fight a government telling you what it’s going to do.”

In some areas, government is powerless. As I’ve noted many times, the bond market is the tail that wags the dog when the dog gets out of line.

But in most cases, the government saying it wants do X very often (almost assuredly) leads to X.

Those who pay attention are prepared for the impacts of X.

So when Trump says he wants to fundamentally change the US dollar… believe him.

Those who don’t pay attention, are—clutch my pearls!—shocked when X actually happens.

This is why I am constantly urging folks to pay attention.

We cannot accept that, because the dollar has lorded over the world for 80 years, the dollar will continue to lord over the world.

We have to accept that the government wants a weaker dollar and that, as such, it will manufacture a weaker dollar.

I wrote back in January that Trump was working to create a crisis so that he could force the dollar lower in the hopes of forcing interest rates lower.

And that is exactly what has happened.

Media on both sides of the aisle and those that ride the middle rail are all now penning stories about Trump purposefully creating the current crisis to impact the dollar and interest rates.

Alas, part of his plan has clearly failed since interest rates have risen, not fallen.

Which is yet another reason you want some of your wealth outside of the dollar.

Interest rates rising is the bond market telling the world that all is not quiet on any front. All is, in fact, problematic for America’s economy, the dollar, and US debt.

The risk is that this crisis reaches a point where it’s no longer contained—that it starts spreading like COVID or the LA fires. At that point, the dollar is deep in the dookie, and Americans are going to feel it, severely, in their personal finances.

So my message to you: Put some of your wealth outside the dollar as a way to protect your spending power from a dollar decline.

What’s the best way to do that?

Well, one way could be opening an Irish bank account… which you could do if you join me in Ireland this October for my Future of Wealth Summit.