Investing offshore

[khunPer]

3 hours ago, cdenn said:

Thanks, that makes sense. I don't think it matters all that much whether it's treated as income or savings because I won't normally be tax resident in Thailand anyway. I looked at the Saxo link but again it asks you for your country of residence and I don't have one (not tax resident anywhere, no right of residence outside the UK, spend no time in the UK, have no home there). The more I think about it the more the issue is not knowing what to put for that question / not knowing what the consequences would be if they decided, maybe several years down the line, that whatever I had put was wrong and the account should never have been opened. I can arrange to be resident in Thailand next year because I will be eligible for a retirement visa, but it's not clear whether this is really necessary just to open an investment account, and anyway it would just be for that one year. Might they come back and check I was still resident in a later year? What would they do if they found that I wasn't? In the meantime, would they report the income to the Thai tax agency, and would that cause a problem given I wouldn't be putting in a tax return? So many unknowns.

Thanks for your reply.

 

Tax residency means that you physically stay in a country for 180 or more days during a calendar year.

 

If you have any kind of taxable personal income, you should be able to obtain a TIN (Tax Identification Number), some banks may ask for that, even you are not fully tax resident.

 

If you are UK resident, you should look into UK tax law, and if UK get any information from offshore banks, and how capital income and capital gain are taxed in UK, if you are not fully tax resident there. In my Danish home country, we are for example not taxed from interest and capital gain, when not fully tax resident. So, when legally tax free, it doesn't matter what a bank reports; it can even be a benefit when claiming dividend withholding tax to be reduced, when being tax resident in another country with lower dividend tax.

 

To my knowledge, the Thai tax department won't get any banking information shared from an offshore bank. This is the trick being tax resident in Thailand – or a country with similar or even better tax-rules – that as long as funds are keep offshore, they are not taxed.

[Liverpool Lou]

On 11/27/2023 at 3:30 PM, Mike Lister said:

The tax changes, effective 1 January 2024, mean that any profit that is brought into Thailand, regardless of when it is brought in, is taxable.

Really?

 

On 11/27/2023 at 3:48 PM, Mike Lister said:

The scope and nature of the new tax change is very unclear, I don't want to speculate on what is or not included because those things are still unclear.

Make up your mind, "specifics" in your first comment and confirmation that you were just speculating in your second post.

Edited November 28, 2023 by Liverpool Lou

[swm59nj]

I recently left Thailand recently after three years.  I have investments in the USA.  Basically a mutual fund and Roll Over IRA.  I had to pay tax on them if they had a profit.  I was only required to pay taxes to the USA.  
But while living in Thailand the brokerage firm I had in the USA had restrictions what I could do with those accounts.  Such as advising me,  and opening any new accounts.  This was not for just Thailand. 

[Mike Lister]

2 hours ago, Liverpool Lou said:

Really?

 

Make up your mind, "specifics" in your first comment and confirmation that you were just speculating in your second post.

Assuming other DTA rules don't apply. yes. If the money is already tax paid and there is a DTA, maybe not. This type of offshore income is exactly what the new tax law is designed to capture.

Edited November 28, 2023 by Mike Lister

[Liverpool Lou]

12 hours ago, Mike Lister said:

This type of offshore income is exactly what the new tax law is designed to capture.

Is it?  How do you know when no one else seems to!?  Where has it been specifically clarified?

Edited November 29, 2023 by Liverpool Lou

[Mike Lister]

27 minutes ago, Liverpool Lou said:

Is it?  How do you know when no one else seems to!?  Where has it been specifically clarified?

 

29 minutes ago, Liverpool Lou said:

Is it?  How do you know when no one else seems to!?  Where has it been specifically clarified?

Yes it is!

Because I read the newspapers  and that's what it says. Maybe they don't, maybe they don't remember because they drink too much or maybe they're just stupid, dunno!

On this occasion, once and once only, I'll do your work for you and post a link to a source that says specifically that, but hereinafter you'll have to do it for yourself, it's not difficult!

You're welcome.

 

"On 15 September 2023, the Director General of the Revenue Department issued the Revenue Departmental Order No. Por. 161/2566 (“Order”) under Section 41, paragraph 2 of the Revenue Code.1 This recent directive has introduced a new twist for Thai tax residents and their offshore investments or portfolio with its new tax guidelines on foreign sourced income".

 

https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=973b6003-ac20-4951-a5c9-aa9214b0ee12

 

 

 

 

[wordchild]

A couple of Thai brokers, that i am aware of, will open offshore trading accounts for customers. Services and markets offered vary from broker to broker, but it is possible to trade offshore and hold the funds outside Thailand with these accounts.

 

[cdenn]

21 hours ago, khunPer said:

Thanks for your reply.

 

Tax residency means that you physically stay in a country for 180 or more days during a calendar year.

 

If you have any kind of taxable personal income, you should be able to obtain a TIN (Tax Identification Number), some banks may ask for that, even you are not fully tax resident.

 

If you are UK resident, you should look into UK tax law, and if UK get any information from offshore banks, and how capital income and capital gain are taxed in UK, if you are not fully tax resident there. In my Danish home country, we are for example not taxed from interest and capital gain, when not fully tax resident. So, when legally tax free, it doesn't matter what a bank reports; it can even be a benefit when claiming dividend withholding tax to be reduced, when being tax resident in another country with lower dividend tax.

 

To my knowledge, the Thai tax department won't get any banking information shared from an offshore bank. This is the trick being tax resident in Thailand – or a country with similar or even better tax-rules – that as long as funds are keep offshore, they are not taxed.

That's interesting. Under the UK system you're either tax resident or not. There's no concept of being fully / partly tax resident there. If you're resident you're taxable on your worldwide income and if you're non-resident you're only taxable on income arising in the UK. It could be that different rules apply to capital gains, I suppose. I'll have to look at that. It's possible to be tax resident in the UK despite spending way way less than 180 days of the year in the country, depending on your circumstances, but anyway I'm not tax resident there. AFAIK all the other countries I visit have the 180 days or more rule, and I haven't spent 180 days in any of them, so currently I'm not tax resident anywhere... but it seems all the banks and platforms require you to state your country of tax residence, which leaves me locked out. I believe they ask so that they can comply with their money laundering obligations, so in a way it's fair enough, but it's still annoying, especially when you don't know if it really matters or if it's just a formality.

[topt]

3 hours ago, cdenn said:

That's interesting. Under the UK system you're either tax resident or not. There's no concept of being fully / partly tax resident there. If you're resident you're taxable on your worldwide income and if you're non-resident you're only taxable on income arising in the UK. It could be that different rules apply to capital gains, I suppose. I'll have to look at that. It's possible to be tax resident in the UK despite spending way way less than 180 days of the year in the country, depending on your circumstances, but anyway I'm not tax resident there. AFAIK all the other countries I visit have the 180 days or more rule, and I haven't spent 180 days in any of them, so currently I'm not tax resident anywhere... but it seems all the banks and platforms require you to state your country of tax residence, which leaves me locked out. I believe they ask so that they can comply with their money laundering obligations, so in a way it's fair enough, but it's still annoying, especially when you don't know if it really matters or if it's just a formality.

So simplistically why not just give them,  in the other countries, your UK NI number and as long as you have agreed with HMRC that you are non resident for tax it will not matter what information the other places send to HMRC ....... 

 

As far as I am aware as a UK tax non-resident the only capital gains you are liable for would be on any property transactions. 

Quote

If you’re abroad

You have to pay tax on gains you make on property and land in the UK even if you’re non-resident for tax purposes. You do not pay Capital Gains Tax on other UK assets, for example shares in UK companies, unless you return to the UK within 5 years of leaving.

https://www.gov.uk/capital-gains-tax/what-you-pay-it-on

[Mike Lister]

On 11/28/2023 at 9:10 PM, Liverpool Lou said:

Really?

 

Make up your mind, "specifics" in your first comment and confirmation that you were just speculating in your second post.

I just spotted this, you appear to be following me around! You quoted two of my posts which appear to contradict each other. In fact, the first refers to investment income, the second refers to property rental income. It is very clear that offshore investment income is taxable in Thailand, providing it is not taxed elsewhere such as at source in the UK. What remains less clear is the rate which that income should be taxed because we now enter into the realm of DTA's and the Thai RD have not made it clear whether the home country rate of taxation will be sufficient or whether they will require additional rates of tax. It also not clear whether the Thai RD will allow such funds to enter Thailand free of tax where they have been the subject of a UK tax return but have attracted zero tax because of the Personal Allowance, effectively a taxed but untaxed scenario. All these things have yet to be clarified. 

 

The second item, property rental income, is taxable in Thailand but even here there are two caveats. The first is whether a country's DTA allows that income to taxed by another country and the second is whether or not the Thai RD will want to tax the profit on a capital item where a capital gains tax return has been filed in the UK. The primary stated purpose of the new tax act is to capture offshore investment income (by citizens), "everyone must pay their share" is what they said. Expats are collateral damage in that process hence the act is not targeted at them primarily but they are obliged to adhere to the terms of the act. As said several times, there are some aspects of the intended act that are clear but there are some scenario's that remain vague. If you are looking for clarity and the definitive answers to all scenario's, they don't exist yet.

[Mike Lister]

15 hours ago, Liverpool Lou said:

Is it?  How do you know when no one else seems to!?  Where has it been specifically clarified?

Here's another one I stumbled across by chance.

 

An article in the Bangkok Post dated 19 September 2023, entitled “Overseas Earnings Targeted”,  says that experts believe the new tax law is targeted at three groups, residents trading in stock using foreign brokerages, crypto traders and Thai’s who have been using the previous year rule to evade tax on other bank and investment accounts. Nowhere in any of the many media articles on this subject are resident foreigners mentioned as being a primary target.