Fed up with taxes, Aussies are following Adrian Portelli to Dubai. The ATO is watching

Adrian Portelli’s rationale for moving to Dubai, at least in his telling, is pretty simple. Australia is “chasing away success”, according to the Melbourne-born billionaire, and entrepreneurs like him will keep leaving with one-way tickets because of exceedingly harsh tax settings.

“I don’t trust the government,” Portelli told Karl Stefanovic in a new episode of the broadcaster’s controversial podcast. “They’ve really come down on me.

“I’ve had regulatory issues to ATO [Australian Taxation Office] issues, and I just can’t handle it.”

Portelli has more than 1 million followers on social media and in August, he told them he was relocating to the Middle East, in response to this year’s federal budget, and its sweeping changes to capital gains and property taxes that sparked warnings that innovation in Australia would be stifled.

Critics, including other young entrepreneurs , united to lobby against changes to capital gains taxes for business. Broadly, Portelli and Stefanovic’s discussion suggested wealthy Australians could vote with their feet and shift their lives and their businesses overseas, to countries where the regulatory burden is less prohibitive.

Portelli is doing so and more are intending to follow his lead, according to Victoria Wells, a Melbourne lawyer who started her firm, Ape Law, in the United Arab Emirates in 2022.

Last month, Wells and partner Stephan Roberto, along with Bali-based influencer couple Matt Cameron and Felicity Morgan, launched the business “Project Get Out”, to capitalise on Australians – particularly those working in tech – wanting to shift overseas.

They received 1000 inquiries shortly after launching – just as Portelli went viral for his move.

But experts warn that it is not always straightforward for relocating Australians to cash in on lower tax rates.

Deakin Business School lecturer Dr Kerui Zhai said Australia’s higher personal income taxes and the changes to capital gains tax were among the incentives for entrepreneurs to relocate to the UAE, where they could obtain “significant tax savings”. But he pointed out that companies with income largely derived from Australia would “probably still be subject to Australian corporate tax”.

About 25,000 Australians live and work in Dubai. Expats from across the world comprise about 88 per cent of the broader UAE population, which hovered at 11 million in 2025, according to the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

While some have left due to the war in Iran, Professor Sunita Jogarajan, from the University of Melbourne Law School, said there was a long-term increase in Australians making the move since the pandemic, with destinations such as Bali and Singapore also spruiking tax benefits to attract expats.

“I can see it from the cases going through the Administrative Review Tribunal. I have been in tax more than 20 years. There just was not as many [cases related to Australians’ tax status] as before,” Jogarajan said.

Tribunal records show the ATO has indeed been pursuing Australians living overseas deemed to be tax residents to pay their share, regardless of where they are.