That’s what’s I’ll figure out soon.
Wire transfer is typically a flat fee and amount sounds about right. What’s annoying is having to pay on the receiving end (don’t get charged by my bank in US to send or receive)
For large amounts it’s not a big deal. For smaller amounts, makes more sense to use a Global Transfer system like HSBC or Citi has (very nominal charge) but really only makes sense if you’re doing this often since you would need to set up an account in your home country
Where on Earth did you hear this? This is not correct. Capital gains from equities are not taxed. Dividends are a different story however. Don’t take my word for it, talk to an accountant.
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https://taxsummaries.pwc.com/taiwan/individual/income-determination
“ Taiwan does not impose a separate capital gains tax (CGT), as all gains, unless specifically exempted by law, or as otherwise regulated, are assessed as ordinary income and subject to regular income tax assessment.”
It’s common sense. No one is going to give you free money. They will tax one way or the other. And it’s clearly mentioned above.
You are misreading the text. Google a bit further.
Ok please explain then. I’d like to know.
KPMG also explains it similar to PWC above:
For interest:
“ in excess of TWD270,000 is considered taxable income.”
They have a table there explaining what is taxable:
Residency status Taxable at:
Grant Vest Exercise
Resident N N Y
Non-resident N N Y
AFAICS, if you exercise your stock( thus have gain income), it is taxable.
Where are you seeing that there is no tax on capital gains whatsoever in Taiwan ?
You may not be paying tax due to double taxation treaty and paying tax in the US itself. That doesn’t mean you’re not liable for tax in Taiwan per se. CMiIW
It’s incorrect . There is tax on capital gains…AFAIK it’s low per cent and also it depends on capital gains from what kind of asset . Yes dividends have a special low tax rate (and still a lot of moaning about it ).
The other thing is they don’t seem to bother tracking your overseas capital gains (although NIH should be tracking your whole income including foreign income those guys have the best database…I think they still need you to self report ).
Nobody said that, you are oversimplifying. There are different kinds of capital gains. Taiwan exempted capital gains achieved by selling listed securities from capital gains tax in 2016. These kind of capital gains are explicitly “exempted by law”.
Capital gains achieved by selling your primary home are also not taxed as ordinary income btw. This is similar to many other countries.
Listed in Taiwan or worldwide?
So are the documents from Pwc or
KPMG wrong?
For offshore income you may check the AMT (Alternative Minimum Tax) rules
No, it’s just that they require a basic understanding of the system to be interpreted correctly. Talking to an accountant might be a good starting point.
Agreed. Let’s take a very narrow case - capital gains on foreign listed securities after exercising them. If CGT had been removed and that income is also exempt from tax, won’t Taiwan be a tax haven for investment? Where is the complication ?
Again, you may check up on the AMT, which was brought to life explicitly for this kind of offshore income scenario. This kind of income used to be tax free until 2006.
The implementation of AMT combined with the relative difficulty of obtaining Taiwan residency prevent it from being a tax haven IMO.
In relation to AMT, as long as your total net worldwide income is below 6.7 million NT$, you pay no taxes. You need to include capital gains in that calculation, but you also can consider capital losses, and other tax deductions.
Be careful which international tax documents you read online, some of them are written pre-2016, and as such are not accurate in relation to taxes on equity based capital gains.
The following is a more in depth look at the Tax situation in Taiwan, and even includes the Gold card visa tax exemption:
Note: Page 55 (with statement concerning taxation of capital gains from equities):
This wasn’t my experience and maybe I’m misunderstanding what you mean. If your foreign sourced income is below 6.7 million it means you aren’t subject to the AMT, but it doesn’t necessarily mean that you pay no taxes. The AMT calculation simply kicks in at that point and you pay the higher of the two between the AMT and standard calculations. Here’s the passage from page 67 of the document you linked:
“Resident taxpayers with AMT taxable income of more than NT$6.7 million may be subject to AMT at the current rate of 20%. Under the Income Basic Tax Act, a taxpayer must calculate the amount of AMT due on income subject to AMT and compare the result with the regular income tax payable. Resident taxpayers must pay the higher of the AMT or regular income tax payable amounts. Any foreign taxes paid on offshore income may be offset against AMT payable with certain limitations.”
As always, best to consult an accountant.
Good catch. My meaning was, in that capital gains from equities are exempt from tax, the “tax” in relation to capital gains only becomes an issue in that capital gains from equities are still considered when calculating total income for AMT.
But as many have said, this is complex. Talk to an accountant to not misunderstand things.
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Then it goes back to what I posted originally doesn’t it? Whether you cross the AMT limit or no, according to pwc’d explanation, your total taxable income will include gains from investments. Just because CGT has been removed, doesn’t mean that income has 0 tax liability IIUC.
No, it is only considered if you cross the AMT threshold, and only in relation to non- Taiwan gains. It is not taxable “income” otherwise.
@DesiInTaipei Just curious, are you thinking that your gains are going to be that high? Just curious. Based on the amounts you are currently dealing with, it really isn’t an issue. I will likely be dealing with much bigger amounts, which is why this is a serious concern for me, where in a few years most of my money will be from the stock market.
Regardless, I will likely never cross the AMT threshold, though.
I figured out how to minimize outgoing wire transfer fees. Brokers like IBKR, TDAM do not charge any fees from their side (not their correspondent banks).
What you have to do is when you initiate the wire transfer from TW, choose the “BEN” option for fees. The beneficiary will cover all the fees, and the only fee you have to pay is what your local bank charges you.
For me this is TWD 350 regardless of the amount. So it works well now.
Note: Your bank teller may not understand the meaning of the BEN option. He/she may call their head office and ask you to change it to “OUR”, but tell them this is what you want.
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By the way, once your external account is setup at your local bank, the speed of transfer is good. I made a wire transfer Friday afternoon around 2:30pm, and it reflected in my TDAM account within 8 hours by evening.