How to sellout IBM stock on corporate register

archer123

I hope someone can give me some guidance on a problem that I should have dealt with many years ago!

I hold IBM stock on the corporate register with Computershare in the US. I have been reinvesting the divis and paying the 15% withholding tax. As I am below tax threshold in the UK, I have been declaring the income but not paid any UK tax, yet.

The problem that I have is that I want to make my financial affairs simpler.

How can I either liquidise this stock up, or transfer it to the UK (in an ISA, for instance) without too much (more) complexity? Or paying too much tax.

Is it better to get an Accountant to work out the CGT liability and take the hit in one go, or to move/sell them some other way? I currently use up my CGT allowance by incrementally selling other US investments.

Some of this IBM stock was bought in the 80's when the employee scheme share-matched, and there has been stock splits, and most divi's re-invested. So the calculation is near-on impossible for me to handle.

Any suggestions?

AnotherJoe

I don't see how an accountant will help because they will need all the numbers and dates from you on which to base any calculation. . Once you've got those the calculations in a spreadsheet should be simple even if arduous. Just take them one ata time.
I suggest you sell the IBM shares within CGT limits (principally the 4x CGT allowance) making your best stab at dates and prices in case HMRC ask and then when you've done with those deal with the other shares later because they are a simpler calculation by the sound of if. Plus from what I've seen you'd want to be selling IBM before it goes down more.
This assumes you don't want to pay CGT. OTherwise just make your best stab at it and put the numbers in your self assessment and pay the tax.

archer123

Joe, Thanks for the quick reply.
I get what you are saying, but if I sell within my CGT band, it will take me 10 years to shift this lot!

And what do you mean by "(principally the 4x CGT allowance)"

Are you saying I do not need to write anything more on my tax return if within this limit?

Already had the HMRC sniffing around claiming they know I have been making 'foreign transactions' and "Is there anything you would like to tell us?" accompanied by veiled threat of investigations.

I just want to make it simple.

PS: what's wrong with IBM, if you think they are on the way down??

AnotherJoe

If you sell less than 4x the CGT limit and didn't make more than the CGT allowance when you sold that amount, you dont need to declare it. Thats assuming there were no other CGT gains. SO for example, say you sold £40k and make £10k CGT on that, then no need to declare. Its in teh SA form somewhere. Thats what I'm using to burn down the US shares i have.

I suggest you take a day or two out and do it methodically, note all the stock split date, get whatever records you have and then do the calculation. IME its the data gathering thats the problem and an accountant cant help with that.
Then either sell as you go or just take the hit.

re whats wrong with IBM, havent IBM's revenues declined pretty much every quarter for the last decade or so?

I was in the industry over a similar timespan to you i suspect, at one point IBM was pretty much always one of the competition, sometimes just "the" competition, but not for the last 15 years or so. Never even encountered them the last ten as a competitor, and I was in high end large scale IT systems sales.

archer123

Thank you, Joe, you have been very helpful.

I think I will try the 4x CGT limit and see if I can stay below the HMRC radar!

As a matter of interest, how do you repatriate your US funds? Computershare want to send me a USD check and these appear difficult to cash, now. I have a borderless account with Transfwise, but they won't use this without a US 'home' address and I sold this years ago.

I looked at transferring them to my US stock dealing account, but they want Medallion Signature Guarantees, everytime. What?

Thanks again.

AnotherJoe

Yes as long as you can show documentation (should you be asked for it) that you didnt make more than the CGT limit) you should be OK. Ten years though is a long time to be burning them down, might IBM shares fall faster than the CGT you'd have to pay?

My US shares are with eTrade and i wire sales proceeds direct to a UK bank account.
I did look at transferwise and similar but in the end decided just to take the hit on exchange rate for the simple life.
Do Computershare not support wiring money?
FWIW I found US cheques (or is that checks:D) weren't difficult to cash (thats what i used to do with eTrade) , just slow and relatively expensive.

archer123

No, Computershare don't do Wire unless you have US address.

I did just find out that my US trading account accepts payments of US checks by photographing them using their app. Great!

Thanks for all your guidance.

green_man

archer123 wrote: »

Thank you, Joe, you have been very helpful.

I think I will try the 4x CGT limit and see if I can stay below the HMRC radar!

As a matter of interest, how do you repatriate your US funds? Computershare want to send me a USD check and these appear difficult to cash, now. I have a borderless account with Transfwise, but they won't use this without a US 'home' address and I sold this years ago.

I looked at transferring them to my US stock dealing account, but they want Medallion Signature Guarantees, everytime. What?

Thanks again.

I had IBM shares gained over a number of years on their stock plan. I left the company (retired) 5 years ago and similarly had the shares transferred to their US Based computershare account. I received quarterly dividend payments in US dollars which I payed into my Halifax current account paying a £6 to £8 fee each time.

The dividends were welcome (IBM being the highest dividend payer of all S&P500 stocks) but I recently decided to sell and instead buy a UK based US fund. Fortunately the total gain in value of my shares didn’t quite make Capital gains an issue. I instead have bought SPDR US Divident Aristocrats ETF for my income portfolio, unfortunately it only pays 2% rather than IBMs 4.5% but is somewhat safer from a capital point of view.

archer123

Don't forget we pay 15% withholding tax on all US divs, so not quite 4.5%.

I always re-invested, but the slip in share price has hit the overall value over the years.

Wish I had sold out when they were over $200 each, then tax wouldn' t have been such a concern

fifer60

I also hold IBM on Computershare as an ex-employee.

International wire transfer of proceeds of sale is supported, I did this in March. It will be a separate choice from domestic US wire transfer.