I’m trying to work out the finer points of when a tax return is required for a person who has no employment income but does have foreign source passive income.
The general requirement is described in [Section 1-5 of the 2023 Income Tax Guide](https://www.nta.go.jp/english/taxes/individual/pdf/incometax_2023/06.pdf), under category 4, “Persons other than the above”. It says that “The amount of tax calculated based on your total amount of income after subtracting all of your deductions including the basic exemption is greater than the amount of your credit for dividends.”
To work out the finer points of how this is applied, I would like to consider two scenarios…
Scenario 1: Consider that the person only has income from foreign source dividends and interest income, and the total taxable income is less than ¥24M. In that case, the income would all be covered under the aggregate taxation method and the ¥480k basic exemption would apply. So it should follow that if the foreign income is less than ¥480k, then (referring to section 1-5, category 4) the “amount of tax” will be zero and therefore it is not required to file a tax return. Is this right?
Scenario 2: Consider that the person only has capital gains income. The 2023 Income Tax Guide says that this falls under separate self assessment taxation, but does not explain whether any exemptions or deductions apply. The Guide says that this is covered on page 3 of the form, and gives a dead end statement on where to get more information. I am looking on the NTA site for details or even a high level summary, but so far I haven’t found it. Any help would be appreciated.
by shrubbery_herring