Do I only have to pay income tax on capital gains?
On the revenue only. This amount of 10$ will be considered as interest and fully taxable. It will not be a capital gain. But why would you decide to declare it as an income? 100$ is insignificant. If you lend small amount to friends it cannot be considered a lending business.
Now i want to get this money in my new UK bank account, does this mean that gov will take taxes from this money as well. Yes that is income and you have to pay tax on that. But it might be a bit complicated than that, so I would ask you to call up HMRC or visit an accountant or maybe ask the finance people of your employer. Also one of my family members send us money every few months and will send to this bank from now on, does taxes also apply on this? See the HMRC page about capital gains tax on gifts: You won't have to pay Capital Gains Tax when you give a gift to your   husband, wife or civil partner - as long as both of the following   apply: It's useful to keep a note of what the asset cost you. Your spouse or   civil partner may need this to work out their Capital Gains Tax when   they dispose of the asset. Example: Mr B lives with his wife and gives her an antique table that   he bought for £12,000 in 2003. Mrs B spends £500 restoring the table,   eventually selling it for £20,000.  Her total costs are £12,500 (£500 plus Mr B's original cost £12,000). Mrs B's   gain is £7,500 (£20,000 less £12,500). When you make a gift to a family member or other person you're   connected with, you'll need to work out the gain or loss. This doesn't   apply to gifts you make to your spouse or civil partner. This also applies if you dispose of an asset to them in any other way   - for example, you sell it to them for a low price. A 'connected person' in this context is someone such as your brother,   sister, child, parent, grandparent, mother-in-law or business partner.   Follow the link below for more information about connected people and   Capital Gains Tax. You must get a valuation of the asset at the time you made the gift.   Use this value in place of any amount you received for the asset to   work out your gain or loss. If you gave the asset away, then of course   the amount you received for it will be nothing. If you make a loss you can only deduct the loss from gains you make on   gifts or other disposals to the same person. Yes, you could avoid capital gains tax altogether, however, capital gains are used in determining your tax bracket even though they are not taxed at that rate.  This would only work in situations where your total capital gains and ordinary income kept you in the 0% longterm capital gains bracket. You can't realize a million dollars in capital gains and have no tax burden due to lack of ordinary income. You can potentially save some money by realizing capital gains strategically. Giving up income in an attempt to save on taxes rarely makes sense. Found a great article (with bibliography) that covers taxation on investment activity by non resident aliens - even covers the special 15% tax on dividends for Canadian residents. It's (dividend tax rate) generally 30% for other NRAs  (your 2nd question). And it confirmed my suspicion that there are no capital gains taxes for NRAs. (1st Q) Source: http://invest-faq.com/articles/tax-non-us-nat.html You only pay tax on the capital gain of the bond, not the principal, unless the source of the money for the principal was gain from another investment, if that makes sense.   In other words, if you bought the bond with income earned from your job, that money was already taxed as income, so it isn't subject to taxation again when you redeem the bond.  On the other hand, if you cashed out of one investment and used those proceeds to buy a bond, then the entire amount might be taxable. Capital gains tax is an income tax upon your profit from selling investments. Long-term capital gains (investments you have held for more than a year) are taxed significantly less than short-term gains. It doesn't limit how many shares you can sell; it does discourage selling them too quickly after buying.  You can balance losses against gains to reduce the tax due. You can look for tax-advantaged investments (the obvious one being a 401k plan, IRA, or equivalent, though those generally require leaving the money invested until retirement). But in the US, most investments other than the house you are living in (which some of us argue isn't really an investment) are subject to capital gains tax, period. "In the UK it all comes down to what HMRC will allow you to charge without taxing you on the ""rent profit"" and not hitting capital gain tax when you sell the house, it may not all count as your ""main home"" if some is rented out.   (http://www.accountingweb.co.uk/ is a good place to ask this type of questions in the uk)" The capital gain is counted as part of your income. So with a million capital gain you will be in a high tax bracket, and have to pay the corresponding capital gains tax rate on the million. "US federal tax law distinguishes many types of income. For most people, most of their income is ""earned income"", money you were paid to do a job. Another category of income is ""capital gains"", money you made from the sale of an asset. For a variety of reasons, capital gains tax rates are lower than earned income tax rates. (For example, it is common that much of the gain is not real profit but inflation. If you buy an asset for $10,000 and sell it for $15,000, you pay capital gains tax on the $5,000 profit. But what if prices in general since you bought the asset have gone up 50%? Then your entire profit is really inflation, you didn't actually make any money -- but you still have to pay a tax on the paper gain.) So if you make your money by investing in assets -- buying and selling at a profit -- you will pay lower taxes than if you made the same amount of money by receiving a salary from a job, or by running a business where you sell your time and expertise rather than an asset. But money made from assets -- capital gains -- is not tax free. It's just a lower tax. It MIGHT be that when combined with other deductions and tax credits this would result in you paying no taxes in a particular year. Maybe you could avoid paying taxes forever if you can take advantage of tax loopholes. But for most people, making money from capital gains could result in lower taxes per dollar of income than someone doing more ordinary work. Or it could result in higher taxes, if you factor in inflation, net present value of money, and so on. BTW Warren Buffet's ""secretary"" is not a typist. She apparently makes at least $200,000 a year. http://www.forbes.com/sites/paulroderickgregory/2012/01/25/warren-buffetts-secretary-likely-makes-between-200000-and-500000year/#ab91f3718b8a. And side note: if Warren Buffet thinks he isn't paying enough in taxes, why doesn't he voluntarily pay more? The government has a web site where citizens can voluntarily pay additional taxes. In 2015 they received $3.9 million in such contributions. http://www.treasurydirect.gov/govt/reports/pd/gift/gift.htm" If you received shares as part of a bonus you needed to pay income tax on the dollar valuse of those shares at the time you received them. This income tax is based on the dollar value of the bonus and has nothing to do with the shares. If you have since sold these shares you will need to report any capital gain or loss you made from their dollar value when you received them. If you made a gain you would need to pay capital gains tax on the profits (if you held them for more than a year you would get a discount on the capital gains tax you have to pay). If you made a loss you can use that capital loss to reduce any other capital gains in that income year, reduce any other income up to $3000 per year, or carry any additional capital loss forward to future income years to reduce any gains or income (up to $3000 per year) you do have in the future. You should get a 1099-MISC for the $5000 you got.  And your broker should send you a 1099-B for the $5500 sale of Google stock. These are two totally separate things as far as the US IRS is concerned. 1) You made $5000 in wages. You will pay income tax on this as well as FICA and other state and local taxes. 2) You will report that you paid $5000 for stock, and sold it for $5500 without holding it for one year. Since this was short term, you will pay tax on the $500 in income you made. These numbers will go on different parts of your tax form.  Essentially in your case, you'll have to pay regular income tax rates on the whole $5500, but that's only because short term capital gains are treated as income.  There's always the possibility that could change (unlikely).  It also helps to think of them separately because if you held the stock for a year, you would pay different tax on that $500.  Regardless, you report them in different ways on your taxes. As JoeTaxpayer has mentioned, please consult a lawyer and CA.  In general you would have to pay tax on the profit you make, in the example on this 10% you make less of any expenses to run the business. depending on how you are incorporating the business, there would be an element of service tax apart from corporate tax or income tax. As per Indian tax laws; income, expense, gain and loss constitute the basic pillars of every individual’s economic life. There are very few cases under which this new 'income' is non taxable. Based on the circumstances, you might have to pay capital gains tax. non-resident aliens to the US do not pay capital gains on US products. You pay tax in your home country if you have done a taxable event in your country. http://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/06/nonusresidenttax.asp#axzz1mQDut9Ru but if you hold dividends, you are subject to US dividend tax. The UK-US treaty should touch on that though. You only have to pay income tax on a tax deferred account (like a 401k) when you withdraw money from it. You might only need $3K to live on a month, or less, so you only have to pay the taxes at that time I believe. "Very interesting question. While searching i also found that some precious metal ETFs (including IAU) gains are taxed at 28% because IRS considers it ""collectible"", rather than the usual long term 15% for stocks and stock holding ETFs. As for capital gain tax you have to pay now my guess it's because of the following statement in the IAU prospectus (page 34): When the trust sells gold, for example   to pay expenses, a Shareholder will   recognize gain or loss ...."