Canadian Citizen and Non Resident for tax purposes
However, you might have to pay taxes on capital gains if these stocks were acquired during your prior residency.
Yes, you still need to pay income tax on your capital gain regardless of whether you converted your USD proceeds back into CAD. When you calculate your gains for tax purposes, you'll need to convert all of your gains to Canadian dollars. Generally speaking, CRA will expect you to use a historical USD to CAD exchange rate published by the Bank of Canada. At that page, notice the remark at right: Are the Exchange Rates Shown Here Accepted by Canada Revenue Agency? Yes. The Agency accepts Bank of Canada exchange rates as the basis for   calculations involving income and expenses that are denominated in   foreign currencies. "If you are a resident of New Zealand for tax purposes, you will be taxed in New Zealand on all of your ""worldwide income"". This is income derived from New Zealand as well as income derived from all other countries Source: http://www.ird.govt.nz/international/nzwithos/income/overseas-income-index.html Another link that will be of use is this: https://www.ato.gov.au/individuals/international-tax-for-individuals/work-out-your-tax-residency/ This is Australia's rules on if you qualify as a resident for tax purposes.  I am not an accountant or a lawyer but my reading of this is you actually have to reside in Australia to be considered a resident - whether or not you have a bank account there doesn't appear to play into it. Additionally, Australia and NZ have a ""double taxation agreement"", explained here: http://www.ird.govt.nz/yoursituation-nonres/double-tax/ So this should prevent you from being taxed in both places." My wife and I are both Canadian citizens living in the US with green card status.  I still have a Canadian RRSP and bank account in Canada that are dormant for the most part.  We use the Canadian debit card only when traveling (which is quite helpful). Neither of us file any paperwork in Canada anymore.  But as others have mentioned, we do file the FBAR form... this takes about 10 minutes and gets mailed somewhere in Michigan if I recall correctly.  (Keep the balance less than $10k total among all foreign accounts and you relieve yourself of this too.) As far as taxes go, we make less interest in our Canadian account than in our US accounts, so the tax burden is less. I'm not missing the point. Canada will still charge you/a corporation income taxes on worldwide income so long as you are resident in Canada. If you are incorporated in Canada but resident elsewhere, you are only subject to tax on Canadian-sourced income. In the US, where you are incorporated is the method of determining liability. Why is one method of determining jurisdiction correct and not the other?  If you are a corporation residing in Canada, you still pay Canadian taxes on worldwide income, even if that income is sourced in another country. Residents of Canada must pay Canadian income tax on their worldwide income (source: Wikipedia). However, there is a tax treaty between the U.S. and Canada; I haven't read it, but my guess is that it will allow you to claim a tax credit in Canada for the capital gains tax you have paid to the U.S. "As I understand it the usual rule is that the country you are ""resident"" in taxes you on your worldwide income but gives you credit for foreign tax paid. The country you are not normally resident in taxes you only on income from that one country. Note that residence for tax purposes can have different rules from residence for immigration purposes. At least in the UK being resident in the country for more than half the tax year normally makes you tax resident and there are some other cases too. I expect other countries are similar but the details of the rules and the start/end of the tax years may vary. I don't know the exact rules for finland and belgium but I expect your Belgian taxes will be based on your Belgian income only and your Finnish taxes will be based on your worldwide income but with a credit for your Belgian taxes. Engaging accountants from both countries to confirm the exact rules and what exactly you should put on the forms is almost certainly a good idea." "It depends on how long you stay and where you earn your income. You can be a US resident for tax purposes even if you are not for immigration purposes. The ""substantive presence test"" probably applies to you: You will be considered a United States resident for tax purposes if you meet the substantial presence test for the calendar year. To meet this test, you must be physically present in the United States (U.S.) on at least: https://www.irs.gov/Individuals/International-Taxpayers/Substantial-Presence-Test There are some exceptions to this test, and tax treaties may also apply.  See IRS Publication 519 for more information." "Does her dad still have the records from those tax years? If so, I would suggest using those as a basis and if they're complete, just filing them directly. If we're talking about software recommendations, I would suggest GenuTax as it allows for completing returns all the way back to 2003 without buying separate versions. Alternatively, there are some no-cost options. See the Wikipedia entry Comparison of Canadian-tax preparation software for personal use. Look both at the ""Price"" column and at the ""Freebies"" column. You should start at 2006 and move forward so you can keep track of carry-forward amounts. I'm assuming your girlfriend had no balance owing from those years as she was a student so there's no penalty to worry about." "The examples you provide in the question are completely irrelevant. It doesn't matter where the brokerage is or where is the company you own stocks in. For a fairly standard case of an non-resident alien international student living full time in the US - your capital gains are US sourced. Let me quote the following text a couple of paragraphs down the line you quoted on the same page: Gain or loss from the sale or exchange of personal property generally   has its source in the United States if the alien has a tax home in the   United States. The key factor in determining if an individual is a   U.S. resident for purposes of the sourcing of capital gains is whether   the alien's ""tax home"" has shifted to the United States. If an alien   does not have a tax home in the United States, then the alien’s U.S.   source capital gains would be treated as foreign-source and thus   nontaxable. In general, under the ""tax home"" rules, a person who is away (or who   intends to be away) from his tax home for longer than 1 year has   shifted tax homes to his new location upon his arrival in that new   location. See Chapter 1 of Publication 463, Travel, Entertainment,   Gift, and Car Expenses I'll assume you've read this and just want an explanation on what it means. What it means is that if you move to the US for a significant period of time (expected length of 1 year or more), your tax home is assumed to have shifted to the US and the capital gains are sourced to the US from the start of your move. For example: you are a foreign diplomat, and your 4-year assignment started in May. Year-end - you're not US tax resident (diplomats exempt), but you've stayed in the US for more than 183 days, and since your assignment is longer than 1 year - your tax home is now in the US. You'll pay the 30% flat tax. Another example: You're a foreign airline pilot, coming to the US every other day flying the airline aircraft. You end up staying in the US 184 days, but your tax home hasn't shifted, nor you're a US tax resident - you don't pay the flat tax. Keep in mind, that tax treaties may alter the situation since in many cases they also cover the capital gains situation for non-residents." There might be a problem. Some reporting paperwork will have to be done for the IRS, obviously, but technically it will be business income zeroed out by business expense. Withholding requirements will shift to your friend, which is a mess. Talk to a licensed tax adviser (EA/CPA) about these. But the immigration may consider this arrangement as employment, which is in violation of the visa conditions. You need to talk to an immigration attorney. "Not really, no. The assumption you're making—withdrawals from a corporation are subject to ""[ordinary] income tax""—is simplistic. ""Income tax"" encompasses many taxes, some more benign than others, owing to credits and exemptions based on the kind of income. Moreover, the choices you listed as benefits in the sole-proprietor case—the RRSP, the TFSA, and capital gains treatment for non-registered investments—all remain open to the owner of a small corporation ... the RRSP to the extent that the owner has received salary to create contribution room. A corporation can even, at some expense, establish a defined benefit (DB) pension plan and exceed individual RRSP contribution limits. Yes, there is a more tax-efficient way for small business owners to benefit when it comes time to retirement. Here is an outline of two things I'm aware of: If your retirement withdrawals from your Canadian small business corporation would constitute withdrawal from the corporation's retained earnings (profits), i.e. income to the corporation that had already been subject to corporate income tax in prior years, then the corporation is able to declare such distributions as dividends and issue you a T5 slip (Statement of Investment Income) instead of a T4 slip (Statement of Remuneration Paid). Dividends received by Canadian residents from Canadian corporations benefit from the Dividend Tax Credit (DTC), which substantially increases the amount of income you can receive without incurring income tax. See TaxTips.ca - Non-eligible (small business) dividend tax credit (DTC). Quote: For a single individual with no income other than taxable Canadian   dividends which are eligible for the small business dividend tax   credit, in 2014 approximately $35,551 [...] could be earned before   any federal* taxes were payable. * Provincial DTCs vary, and so combined federal/provincial maximums vary. See here. If you're wondering about ""non-eligible"" vs. ""eligible"": private small business corporation dividends are generally considered non-eligible for the best DTC benefit—but they get some benefit—while a large public corporation's dividends would generally be considered eligible. Eligible/non-eligible has to do with the corporation's own income tax rates; since Canadian small businesses already get a big tax break that large companies don't enjoy, the DTC for small businesses isn't as good as the DTC for public company dividends. Finally, even if there is hardly any same-year income tax advantage in taking dividends over salary from an active small business corporation (when you factor in both the income tax paid by the corporation and the individual), dividends still allow a business owner to smooth his income over time, which can result in a lower lifetime average tax rate. So you can use your business as a retained earnings piggy bank to spin off dividends that attract less tax than ordinary income. But! ... if you can convince somebody to buy your business from you, then you can benefit from the lifetime capital gains exemption of up to $800,000 on qualifying small business shares. i.e. you can receive up to $800K tax-free on the sale of your small business shares. This lifetime capital gains exemption is a big carrot—designed, I believe, to incentivize Canadian entrepreneurs to develop going-concern businesses that have value beyond their own time in the business. This means building things that would make your business worth buying, e.g. a valued brand or product, a customer base, intellectual property, etc. Of course, there are details and conditions with all of what I described, and I am not an accountant, so please consult a qualified, conflict-free professional if you need advice specific to your situation." Where you earn your money makes no difference to the IRS.  Citizen/permanent resident means you pay income tax. To make matters worse given your situation it's virtually certain you have unreported foreign bank accounts--something that's also an important issue. It's not just the US based mailing address for registration or US based credit-card or bank account: even if you had all these, like I do, you will find that  these online filing companies do not have the infrastructure to handle non-resident taxes. The reason why the popular online filing companies do not handle non-resident taxes is because: Non-residents require a different set of forms to fill out - usually postfixed NR - like the 1040-NR. These forms have different rules and templates that do not follow the usual resident forms. This would require non-trivial programming done by these vendors All the NR forms have detailed instructions and separate set of non-resident guides that has enough information for a smart person to figure out what needs to be done. For example, check out Publication 519 (2011), U.S. Tax Guide for Aliens. As a result, by reading these most non-residents (or their accountants) seem to figure out how the taxes need to be filed. For the remaining others, the numbers perhaps are not significant enough to justify the non-trivial programming that need to be done by these vendors to incorporate the non-resident forms. This was my understanding when I did research into tax filing software. However, if you or anyone else do end up finding tax filing software that does allow non-resident forms, I wil be extremely happy to learn about them. To answer your question: you need to do it yourself or get it done by someone who knows non-resident taxes. Some people on this forum, including me for gratis, would be glad to check your work once you are done with it as long as you relieve us of any liability. *Disclaimer: I am a tax accountant , but I am not your professional accountant or advocate (unless you have been in my office and signed a contract). This communication is not intended as tax advice, and no tax accountant / client relationship results. *Please consult your own tax accountant for tax advise.** A foreign citizen may form a limited liability company. In contrast, all profit distributions (called dividends) made by a C corporation are subject to double taxation. (Under US tax law, a nonresident alien may own shares in a C corporation, but may not own any shares in an S corporation.) For this reason, many foreign citizens form a limited liability company (LLC) instead of a C corporation A foreign citizen may be a corporate officer and/or director, but may not work/take part in any business decisions in the United States or receive a salary or compensation for services provided in the United States unless the foreign citizen has a work permit (either a green card or a special visa) issued by the United States. Basically, you should be looking at benefiting only from dividends/pass-through income but not salaries or compensations. In theory, when you obtained ownership of your USD cash as a Canadian resident [*resident for tax purposes, which is generally a quicker timeline than being resident for immigration purposes], it is considered to have been obtained by you for the CAD equivalent on that date.  For example if you immigrated on Dec 31, 2016 and carried $10k USD with you, when the rate was ~1.35, then Canada deems you to have arrived with $13.5k CAD. If you converted that CAD to USD when the rate was 1.39, you would have received 13.9k CAD, [a gain of $400 to show as income on your tax return].  Receiving the foreign inheritances is a little more complex; those items when received may or may not have been taxable on that day. However whether or not they were taxable, you would calculate a further gain as above, if the fx rate gave you more CAD when you ultimately converted it. If the rate went the other way and you lost CAD-value, you may or may not be able to claim a loss. If it was a small loss, I wouldn't bother trying to claim it due to hassle. If it's a large loss, I would be very sure to research thoroughly before claiming, because something like that probably has a high chance of being audited.