FBAR for securities accounts

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ewax
Posts: 7
Joined: Wed Mar 16, 2016 1:25 pm

FBAR for securities accounts

Post by ewax »

I'm a US citizen living in Canada with a couple Canadian domiciled investment accounts, one is an RRSP and the other is a regular non-registered account. In both of them, I have investments purely in stocks.

Two things I have questions about:

1. I thought originally that I only had to include bank accounts on my FBAR, but I've been reading that investment accounts like I described I have should also be included as "Securities" accounts on my FBAR. Is that correct?

2. Assuming I do need to include these accounts on my FBAR, for "Maximum value of account during calendar year" should I be inputing the highest cash balance or the total balance of the stocks' value? Or should it be both numbers together? It seems odd to me to be tracking when I had the highest value of stocks I'm holding since they're obviously fluctuating throughout the year which is something totally out of my control. I'm getting more confused even thinking about finding this number right now so if this is required any additional details you could provide would be much appreciated!

Thanks!
nelsona
Posts: 18311
Joined: Wed Oct 27, 2004 2:33 pm
Location: Nowhere, man

Post by nelsona »

Of course you report investment accounts. That is why they have check boxes for securities accounts. The form is also called: "Report of Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts".

And you report the highest value of the account, not the cash only. There are instructions on how to pick the highest value. you can use the highest statement balance.

Otherwise drug dealers etc would simply buy stocks, say they have no cash, and never report FBAR, which would defeat the intent of FBAR.
nelsona non grata. Non pro. Please Search previous posts, no situation is unique as you might think. Happy Browsing :D
ewax
Posts: 7
Joined: Wed Mar 16, 2016 1:25 pm

Post by ewax »

Thanks!
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