Im a non U.S citizen living in Thailand and Im also a non resident of my country for tax purposes. My tax office back in the nanny state knows about this.

 

Ive registered with a U.S based cryptocurrency exchange and have transferred money to my wallet and purchased bitcoin. Down the track if I sell my bitcoin and make a capital gain will the IRS be chasing me for tax as a non U.S citizen? I read this article:

 

https://www.cnbc.com/2017/10/20/using-bitcoin-to-buy-a-sandwich-could-trigger-a-tax-bill-commentary.html

 

If you have any accounting knowledge on this issue can you please advise what the go is?

 

Many thanks

If you post your question on

 

fairmark.com

 

you will get a well-informed answer, probably from a certified public accountant.

That article is only talking about US residents. The way the IRS sees cryptocurrencies, Everytime you buy something with them it is as if you sold it for USD and used that to buy the item . So if you bought BTC at $1000 and then bought a $5 sandwich when it was $5000, you made a $4 profit. If you are  a US citizen, then you report that income to the IRS. Otherwise, you report it to your own country and the IRS is not involved.

 

The only issue for non resident aliens in the USA is if the money is "effectively connected" to the US. I can not see how Bitcoin could ever meet that definition, as it has no connection to the USA at all. And anything you might purchase from the USA is done as a fair trade. You change BTC into USD, generating a tax liability in your country, and then use that to buy US goods.

 

I just don't see any way without a change in the law a non resident alien could generate a US tax liability from trading cryptocurrencies.