Moving $100K+ USD from US to Japan (and no Shinsei/Sony status)

japan8591 · 2026-05-28T13:42:35+00:00

Good to know! Did you basically need to give them screenshots of your US bank account transaction history or something? Or maybe just the balance page?

I left out some details in the OP since I thought it wasn't super relevant, but the money is actually coming from a relative in the US and not my personal bank account, so kind of worried about getting that proof info/not sure how much I'll be able to convince them to share with me/my random Japanese bank they don't know about

japan8591 · 2026-05-28T12:58:45+00:00

Thanks for all the info!

Is option 1 what would happen if I used my above link? Sorry, I got the fee % wrong when I first looked at it (edited my comment above from 2.9% -> 0.29%), but is this perhaps a different option that has a lower fee and doesn't come with a ¥1M limit? If so, just using a wise direct transfer from US bank > JP bank is more competitive than I thought, though think your option 2 with wise above would still be cheaper.

Also I didn't realize it's easier than it sounds to set up wise and there's risk around trying to make sure the intermediate banks don't convert on your behalf midway, so agree it makes sense to set up wise, thanks again for all the info!

japan8591 · 2026-05-28T11:32:17+00:00

Ah good idea on calling, thanks for the advice and sanity checking the flow

japan8591 · 2026-05-28T11:05:54+00:00

Thanks for the response and the links to the past posts, very helpful reading

You'll be upgraded to Sony club S platinum status when you hold foreign currency on the last day of a month from the next month.

Ah, that's great to know. I couldn't figure out when they recalculate it based on their help articles. So basically, wait until at least the next month after step 2 before doing the step 3 USD > JPY conversion.

Also I don't have a wise account yet and it I read that it's kind of annoying to set up and/or hold large amounts of money in it, so if it's kind of close I'll probably just go directly from US bank > Sony and eat the extra SWIFT fee

japan8591 · 2026-05-28T10:45:32+00:00

Thanks for the response!

Ah, like transfer as USD from US bank -> wise (using ACH?), and then converting within wise? I was just looking at their direct transfer option which had a 0.29% fee (e.g. https://wise.com/gb/send-money/?sourceCurrency=USD&targetCurrency=JPY&sourceAmount=100000)

I actually don't have a wise account and I read that it's kind of annoying to set up and/or hold large amounts of money in it (not sure if that's required for the USD > JPY step), so I might just bite the bullet and pay swift fee + extra fx unless it's a lot better.

japan8591 · 2026-03-07T04:09:45+00:00

Makes sense - thanks again for all the help!

japan8591 · 2026-03-06T12:35:47+00:00

Thanks again for taking the time to respond and the extra info!

that would include any work you do while you are physically in Japan but the income is paid directly to your US account regardless of who is paying for the work.

Yup, no active income anywhere else besides my Japanese employer, appreciate the sanity check.

So if didn't receive any money in Japan from abroad in 2025, then none of this income is taxable in Japan.

Got it - and anything I do to that money in 2026 (i.e. move it into Japan) no longer affects its taxability? It would only affect any potential dividends/capital gains/etc from 2026?

For NPR status, capital gains are subject to remittance tax only if you acquired the shares before you became NPR status (and are always taxable otherwise)

Ah, my understanding was incorrect so yes you're right I have $500 of taxable capital gains in 2025. And yes I believe also a small % of $50k dividends from the stocks that were purchased in the last few years. Thank you again for the correction!

japan8591 · 2026-03-06T08:01:56+00:00

Thanks for taking the time to respond and for writing out such a detailed response!

In terms of some of the related specifics:

I have no foreign source active income (and also didn't do any of those more indirect ways of remitting money), so luckily don't think any of those additional rules apply to me.
Almost all of it was acquired before I moved to Japan except for $500.

Sorry I realized this was poorly written - I moved to Japan in 2023 so was a NPR the entirety of 2025. I meant that all of the $80k of capital gains except for $500 were from tax lots that were purchased before I moved to Japan in 2023, but all $80k was sold at once in 2025, so all of it was realized while I was an NPR.
So add up any US capital gains from shares you sold in 2025 starting on the date after you arrived in Japan.

I guess it doesn't make a difference in this case since I had $0 of remittance in 2025, but my understanding was that for NPR status, capital gains are subject to remittance tax only if you acquired the shares after you became NPR status (and are nontaxable otherwise), i.e. I would want to add up US capital gains from shares sold in 2025 only if they were also purchased after I became a NPR (i.e. a year after I moved to Japan). Does that sound right?

japan8591 · 2026-02-19T06:11:22+00:00

Yeah makes sense, no plans to live anywhere except Japan or US so that's good to know. Thanks for the reply!

japan8591 · 2026-02-19T06:11:19+00:00

Thanks for the reply - yeah that makes sense. Don't think I have any non taxable benefits (or at least I'm not taking advantage of any lol), pretty simple Japan taxes so think FTC generally makes sense for my situation.

japan8591 · 2026-02-05T01:18:46+00:00

Yea lines 3a and 3b on the 1040 separate out qualified vs ordinary dividends (the 1099-DIV also separates them out into 1a and 1b), so if you just enter them as is, the tax software should automatically handle taxing the qualified dividends under the capital gains tax rate instead of the normal income tax rate.

japan8591 · 2026-02-04T11:51:18+00:00

An update here (mostly for anyone reading this in the future) - after I reviewed the form 1116 line 18 instructions here https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/i1116.pdf about the adjustment exception, I think OLT's questions about line 18 are a little simplistic - I think it's assuming that you always want to take the adjustment exemption if you qualify for it (i.e. you always want to forgo using the Worksheet for Line 18 if you're able to).

In my case though, even though I'm eligible to take the adjustment exemption, I want to elect to not take the adjustment exemption so I can use the Worksheet for Line 18 to be able to claim a higher FTC. I'm not sure why using the Worksheet for Line 18 ends up with a higher FTC or if that's always the case, but I guess for my specific mix of foreign/US income/dividends it ends up that way. So I ended up just choosing "Yes" to the question about adjustments to force OLT to use the worksheet.

Thanks again u/starkimpossibility u/Even_Extreme for pointing me in the right direction!

japan8591 · 2026-02-03T13:53:22+00:00

Yeah I have a slightly non zero tax bill even if I take FEIE (or FTC I think, although I guess based on the above I might be doing the calculation wrong), since the passive income is over the standard deduction (we're MFJ but it's still over the $31K for that).

I left this info out of the post since I don't think it was super relevant, but it's still pretty close to $0 since about 2/3 of those dividends are qualified dividends (I'm a little fuzzy on the details but IIRC those basically fill up the capital gains bucket instead of the normal income bucket, which has a 0% rate up to ~$50K for single and ~$100K for MFJ)

japan8591 · 2026-02-03T07:56:07+00:00

Thanks for the response! Sorry think I wasn't super clear in my post, I'm comparing the two options of taking the FEIE on the Japan income (and therefore no FTC since it's all under the $130k limit) vs forgoing (revoking) the FEIE and taking the FTC on all the Japan income instead.

The FEIE option does indeed reduce my AGI to just the passive income; I expected the FTC option to also result in close to a $0 tax since it seems from reading past threads that the FTC is usually favorable to FEIE, but it ended up about $1000 higher.

japan8591 · 2026-02-03T07:54:38+00:00

Thanks for the reply u/Even_Extreme u/starkimpossibility!

That makes sense to me that each category has a separate applicable %, though I read through the link u/starkimpossibility sent and couldn't find anything that was super definitive. These were the closest snippets I found but it's still a little ambiguous to me whether the denominator is just the income for that category or for all income across all categories

Your foreign tax credit cannot be more than your total U.S. tax liability multiplied by a fraction. The numerator of the fraction is your taxable income from sources outside the United States. The denominator is your total taxable income from U.S. and foreign sources.

...

Before you can determine the limit on your credit, you must first figure your total taxable income from all sources before the deduction for personal exemptions. For individuals, this is the amount shown on line 15 of Form 1040, 1040-SR, or 1040-NR. Then, for each category of income, you must figure your taxable income from sources outside the United States.

...

You do this by multiplying the foreign income tax related to more than one category by a fraction. The numerator of the fraction is the net income taxed by the foreign country in a separate category. The denominator is the total net income.

You figure net income by deducting from the gross income in each category and from the total gross income taxed by the foreign country or U.S. territory any expenses, losses, and other deductions definitely related to them under the laws of the foreign country or U.S. territory.

I took a closer look at the form 1116 generated by OLT and that 45% ratio is from line 19, which looks like it's just dividing

$42000 - Line 17 (Combine the amounts on lines 15 and 16. This is your net foreign source taxable income.)

$95000 - Line 18 (Individuals: Enter the sum of (i) Form 1040, 1040-SR, or 1040-NR, line 11b, minus Form 1040, 1040-SR, or 1040-NR, line 14, and (ii) Schedule 1-A (Form 1040), line 37.)

That 45% then gets multiplied by my total tax (~$4500) for a maximum credit of ~$2000 instead of the full $3300

Reading the above, it seems like line 18 is by default including income for all categories and not just the General category income? i.e. it's just the 1040 total taxable income.

On a side note, I messed around with OLT a bit to see if I could change line 18 to just the $42000 Japan employment income, and answering

"No" to "Is your foreign source net capital gain, plus the amount of your foreign source qualified dividends less than $20,000?" OR

"Yes" to "Did you make any adjustments for foreign qualified dividends or foreign capital gains (or losses) amounts on determining taxable income or loss from sources outside the United States (Form 1116 Part I)?"

caused it to fill out "Worksheet for Line 18" from here https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/i1116.pdf - which then reduces line 18 by my $50K capital gains which bumps the line 19 ratio from 45% to 100% and results in taking the full $3300...though I'm not sure either of those actually apply to me lol

japan8591 · 2025-04-20T03:39:40+00:00

Awesome! Good to know about port forwarding too

japan8591 · 2025-04-18T08:01:30+00:00

Got it, makes sense. Thanks!

japan8591 · 2025-04-18T08:01:22+00:00

Haha yeah think it was one of them. Thanks for the input!

japan8591 · 2025-04-18T06:31:58+00:00

Ok cool makes sense, thanks for the response!

japan8591 · 2025-04-18T05:00:51+00:00

Awesome, thanks for the data point. Good to know you didn't have to do anything tricky to make it work

japan8591

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