Hi, just received the following message from IB, surprised I can´t find a similar message on this forum nor through a google search, if it also applies to bond interest payments, it´s nasty. Still having a deposit under review with IB, bad week, but hard to believe that measure would only apply to accounts selected by IB. Anybody got the same message ? Dear Client, According to the 1997 Irish Tax Consolidation Act, IBKR is required to withhold 20% tax on interest payments to individuals regardless of resident status. For this reason, IBKR has withheld this amount for your current monthly interest earnings in account U********, as well as those on interest earned since January 1, 2022. You will start to see this withholding as of October 5, 2022. Going forward, withholding will occur every month. We apologize for the inconvenience in 2022.
Lots of discussion on Reddit WTF? 20% Withholding tax? : interactivebrokers (reddit.com) Just received from IBKR: 20% tax on interest payments to individuals regardless of resident status!! : interactivebrokers (reddit.com)
Professional courtesy. IRS withholds 25% of all my Social Security benefits. Been doing that for years.
Didn´t notice any new witholding tax on my IB statement so went to the Reddit thread and found this update : "EDIT: just spoke to IBKR (Hungrian office) and: 20% Irish tax applies only to interest gained on long-term cash positions (https://www.interactivebrokers.com/en/accounts/fees/pricing-interest-rates.php) so no dividends, no bonds payments, no shares lending it is possible to have the account transferred to Hungary, but you need to open a brand new account and then transfer your positions to it. Better way to do it is to open web ticket with them." Pretty sure I´ve earned interests in long term cash positions though, but that would be a small issue, especially I can easily deduct 75% of the Irish witholding tax from my Spanish tax. About switching to IB hungary, there´s another thread here mentioning this entity not being able to pay interests on cash balances so if that´s the case that wouldn´t help at all