Forming a US LLC from Brazil

US ownership

100%

US visit or SSN needed to form

No

Home-country regime

Banco Central do Brasil, Resolução BCB nº 279/2022 — Brazilian capital abroad is declarable to the Banco Central (CBE) at published thresholds: annually at US$1 million or more on 31 December, quarterly at US$100 million or more

Membership, year one

$399/yr

The sheet in one view

Forming the LLC is a state filing: Articles of Organization, a registered agent in the formation state, and a fee that in the three states surveyed below runs from $125 to $300. No US address of your own, no US visit and no US tax number is required; the EIN follows on paper — fax, phone or mail. The Brazilian side has no approval step for the formation itself. Its two touchpoints are the money's channel (an institution authorised by the Banco Central to operate in the foreign-exchange market) and its visibility (§ 2): the Banco Central's declaration of Brazilian capital abroad, and your annual tax return. Neither blocks the formation; both punish being discovered late.

What Brazil asks of you

Brazilian capital abroad — capitais brasileiros no exterior — is governed for declaration purposes by the Banco Central do Brasil's Resolução BCB nº 279, de 31 de dezembro de 2022. The resolution treats assets held abroad by residents, including participations in companies, as Brazilian capital abroad that may be applied in the modalities regularly practised in the international market, and it sets the declaration — the CBE — by threshold rather than by transaction.

The published thresholds are these. A resident whose Brazilian capital abroad totals US$1,000,000 or more on 31 December files the annual CBE declaration with the Banco Central. At US$100,000,000 or more on a quarterly base date (31 March, 30 June, 30 September), the declaration is quarterly. Below the annual threshold, the resolution requires no CBE for that year — which describes nearly every founder reading this sheet at formation, and is a fact to record, not a loophole to celebrate: the threshold is tested on everything you hold abroad together, not on the LLC alone, and a growing company crosses it quietly.

Two boundaries this sheet keeps explicit. First, the CBE is a statistical declaration to the Banco Central; it is not the tax return. How your participation in the LLC is entered in your Declaração de Imposto de Renda (in Bens e Direitos), and how income the company pays you is taxed in Brazil, are Receita Federal questions for your contador on your facts — this sheet does not state rates or treatments it has not read in an official Brazilian source for your situation. Second, the remittance itself: send the formation funding through an institution authorised by the Banco Central to operate in the foreign-exchange market, contracted as what it is — capital going into your own foreign company — and keep the exchange contract with the formation papers. A transfer coded as something it is not is the one Brazilian mistake that cannot be tidied up afterwards.

Choosing the state from Brazil

Brazilian founders in this Atlas most often survey three states, and the first is not close. Florida ($125 to form, $138.75 a year, report due by May 1) is the corridor's home state — the deepest Brazilian commercial presence in the US, Portuguese-speaking professional services in the formation counties, and the name Brazilian clients and banks recognise first. Texas ($300 to form, no Secretary of State annual report) is the low-paperwork alternative, its recurring duty reduced to the Comptroller's May 15 franchise-tax and Public Information Report. New York ($200 to form, a $9 biennial statement) is chosen when the business genuinely trades on a New York presence, and carries the newspaper-publication requirement priced on its dossier. If your reading keeps landing on Wyoming or Delaware, both are sold here on the same terms as every other state: this service covers 50 states + DC, at joining and at renewal, and their dossiers — Wyoming and Delaware — carry the verified fees and duties. Puerto Rico is not served by this Atlas.

The EIN from Brazil

Your LLC needs its own Employer Identification Number, and you do not need an SSN or an ITIN first. The IRS's routes for an applicant whose principal place of business is outside the United States are: by phone on 267-941-1099 (not toll-free, Monday–Friday 6 a.m.–11 p.m. Eastern — that window is 8:00 a.m. to 1:00 a.m. Brasília time the following day during US standard time, one of the kindest windows in this Atlas), by fax to 304-707-9471 from outside the US (855-215-1627 from within it), or by mail to the IRS's EIN International Operation in Cincinnati. Fax returns the number generally within four business days when a return fax number is provided; mail takes approximately four weeks; and a new EIN can take up to two weeks to pass the IRS's TIN-matching systems even though it is usable immediately for a bank account, licences and paper returns. On Form SS-4, the responsible party is you — the individual who ultimately owns or controls the company — and line 7b reads “foreign” where that person has no SSN or ITIN and is not eligible for one. The full treatment — EIN basics, the routes compared, the annotated form, and what to do when the confirmation notice (CP 575, or Letter 147C if the original is lost) goes missing — is the EIN guide on this site. One EIN per responsible party per day, by any route — do not fax and phone the same application.

Banking and getting paid

Stripe's global-availability page, read on the survey date, lists Brazil among the countries it supports. So the Brazilian founder's getting-paid question is the comparison question: charge through a Brazilian Stripe account on a Brazilian entity, or through the US LLC on a US account — and the answer is decided per platform, on each entity's file and its published terms, not by this sheet. What the LLC adds, and what founders in this corridor actually buy it for, is the US side of the counter: a US company with an EIN that US clients, marketplaces and banks can contract with and pay as a domestic business.

US banking examines the same file everywhere in this Atlas: filed Articles of Organization, the EIN confirmation, a signed operating agreement, identification and home-address evidence matching character for character, and a specific description of the activity. The full file, and how a bank verifies the EIN itself, is set out on this site's EIN guide. Two Brazil-specific disciplines sit on top of it. Keep the exchange contract from § 2 with the file — when a US bank asks where the opening funds came from, a Banco Central-authorised exchange contract is the strongest one-page answer a Brazilian founder can hand over. And keep the company's money visibly the company's: the CBE threshold in § 2 is tested on your aggregate holdings abroad, and a clean separation between the LLC's accounts and your personal ones is what makes that test answerable in an afternoon instead of an audit.

The tax map in brief

A single-member LLC owned by a non-resident is disregarded for US federal income tax by default — and since 2017 that status carries an annual information filing: Form 5472 attached to a pro-forma Form 1120, reporting transactions with you, including your own funding of the company. The penalty the IRS states for a missing or late Form 5472 starts at $25,000. Multi-member LLCs file as partnerships instead. When a US payer needs your company's tax status documented, the form in the file is generally Form W-8BEN-E. The Brazilian side of the tax map — the participation's entry in your annual return and the taxation of what the company pays you — is your contador's territory on your facts; this sheet prints the Banco Central's declaration thresholds (§ 2) and no Brazilian tax treatment it cannot source. Form 5472 is treated in full on this site's EIN guide. None of this page is tax advice — it is the map of which questions exist, so none of them ambushes you in your second year.

The two-row calendar — home-country + US duty

Cost of ownership

Compare five-year figures, not formation fees. Florida costs $462 more than Texas across five years on this table and is still the corridor's default — the premium buys the state your counterparties already know. Add your contador's annual cost in Brazil; for a founder with a foreign company to declare, it is not optional spend.

Perguntas de fundadores brasileiros (FAQ in Portuguese)

Um residente no Brasil pode ser dono de 100% de uma LLC nos EUA?

Sim, dos dois lados: nenhum estado deste Atlas exige sócio, cidadão ou residente americano, e o arcabouço do Banco Central trata a participação em empresa no exterior como capital brasileiro no exterior — uma categoria reconhecida, declarada nos termos da § 2, e não uma permissão a pedir.

Preciso declarar a LLC ao Banco Central?

Depende do total. Pela Resolução BCB nº 279/2022, a declaração anual de Capitais Brasileiros no Exterior (CBE) é devida quando o total dos seus bens no exterior atinge US$ 1.000.000 ou mais em 31 de dezembro; a partir de US$ 100.000.000, a declaração é trimestral. Abaixo do limiar anual, não há CBE naquele ano — mas o teste soma tudo o que você detém no exterior, não apenas a LLC.

Como envio o dinheiro para capitalizar a empresa?

Por uma instituição autorizada pelo Banco Central a operar no mercado de câmbio, com o contrato de câmbio descrevendo o que a remessa é: capital para a sua própria empresa no exterior. Guarde o contrato junto aos documentos de constituição — ele é a prova da origem dos fundos que o banco americano vai pedir (§ 2 e § 5).

Preciso de ITIN para obter o EIN da LLC?

Não. O EIN é o número da empresa, pedido no formulário SS-4 com “foreign” na linha 7b quando a parte responsável não tem SSN nem ITIN e não é elegível a um (§ 4). O ITIN é um número pessoal, para obrigações pessoais nos EUA; precisar dele depois não bloqueia o EIN agora.

A LLC me dá acesso ao Stripe?

O Stripe já opera no Brasil — a página de disponibilidade global do Stripe, lida na data desta folha, lista o Brasil. A LLC acrescenta o outro lado: uma empresa americana com EIN, capaz de aplicar, em nome próprio, por conta e recebimento nos EUA, conforme os termos publicados de cada plataforma (§ 5).

O que devo a cada ano?

Nos EUA: a taxa estadual do estado de constituição (tabela acima), a renovação da assinatura de $399 a partir do ano 2, se continuar conosco, e a declaração informativa federal da sua estrutura (§ 6). No Brasil: a CBE se o limiar for atingido, e o registro da participação na sua declaração anual, conforme o seu contador orientar.

Sources: Banco Central do Brasil — Resolução BCB nº 279, de 31 de dezembro de 2022 (capitais brasileiros no exterior: declaração anual à CBE a partir de US$1.000.000 em 31 de dezembro; declaração trimestral a partir de US$100.000.000 nas datas-base trimestrais), bcb.gov.br · IRS — “Employer Identification Number” and Instructions for Form SS-4 (Rev. December 2025), irs.gov · Instructions for Form 5472 (penalty), irs.gov · Stripe global availability, stripe.com/global, read 2026-11-07 · State fees and duties: data/state-fees.json, verified against official state sources 2026-11-03/04. Surveyed 2026-11-07. Education, not advice: this sheet is formation information, not legal, foreign-exchange or tax advice.