About The Instructor
William Sharp is an attorney in Holland & Knight's Atlanta, Tampa and San Francisco offices (residing in Atlanta and San Francisco) with more than 35 years of experience representing clients in a wide variety of international tax planning and tax controversy cases. Mr. Sharp provides international and domestic tax advice to numerous U.S.-based and foreign-based clients, including publicly traded and closely held entities. His tax practice also focuses on globally oriented high-net-worth clients, including many U.S. and foreign-based family offices. Mr. Sharp has served as lead counsel with respect to U.S. Tax Court proceedings, Internal Revenue Service (IRS) appeals and examination cases. He also has served as lead counsel or co-counsel to more than 1,500 IRS voluntary disclosure cases.
Mr. Sharp advises financial institutions and their clients on international tax enforcement and compliance initiatives. In addition, Mr. Sharp represents several Swiss-based banking institutions in connection with the U.S. Department of Justice Swiss Bank Program, including the largest bank participating in the program and one of the major cantonal banks (both cases were resolved under Category 3 of the program). Mr. Sharp also has extensive experience in handling matters related to the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) and other cross-border compliance and disclosure initiatives.
Mr. Sharp has served as an adjunct professor at the Stetson University College of Law and a lecturer at the University of South Florida Executive MBA program. He is a frequent speaker on international tax and business law matters. In addition, Mr. Sharp has been featured as well as quoted in publications such as the Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Reuters, USA Today and other media on international tax issues.
Prior to joining Holland & Knight, Mr. Sharp was founding and managing partner of a boutique international tax law firm with offices in Tampa, San Francisco, Washington, D.C., and Zurich, Switzerland.