Nonresident Aliens

A nonresident alien usually is subject to U.S. income tax only on U.S. source income. Under limited circumstances, certain foreign source income is subject to U.S. tax. See Foreign Income in chapter 4.

The general rules for determining U.S. source income that apply to most nonresident aliens are shown in Table 2-1. The following discussions cover the general rules as well as the exceptions to these rules.

Not all items of U.S. source income are taxable. See chapter 3.

Interest

Generally, U.S. source interest income includes the following items.

• Interest on bonds, notes, or other interest-bearing obligations of U.S. residents or domestic corporations.
• Interest paid by a domestic or foreign partnership or foreign corporation engaged in a U.S. trade or business at any time during the tax year.
• Original issue discount.
• Interest from a state, the District of Columbia, or the U.S. Government.

The place or manner of payment is immaterial in determining the source of the income.

A substitute interest payment made to the transferor of a security in a securities lending transaction or a sale-repurchase transaction is sourced in the same manner as the interest on the transferred security.

Exceptions. U.S. source interest income does not include the following items.

1. Interest paid by a resident alien or a domestic corporation if for the 3-year period ending with the close of the payer's tax year preceding the interest payment at least 80% of the payer's total gross income:
   1. Is from sources outside the United States, and
   2. Is attributable to the active conduct of a trade or business by the individual or corporation in a foreign country or a U.S. possession.
2. Interest paid by a foreign branch of a domestic corporation or a domestic partnership on deposits or withdrawable accounts with mutual savings banks, cooperative banks, credit unions, domestic building and loan associations, and other savings institutions chartered and supervised as savings and loan or similar associations under federal or state law if the interest paid or credited can be deducted by the association.
3. Interest on deposits with a foreign branch of a domestic corporation or domestic partnership, but only if the branch is in the commercial banking business.

Dividends

In most cases, dividend income received from domestic corporations is U.S. source income. Dividend income from foreign corporations is usually foreign source income. Exceptions to both of these rules are discussed below.

A substitute dividend payment made to the transferor of a security in a securities lending transaction or a sale-repurchase transaction is sourced in the same manner as a distribution on the transferred security.

First exception. Dividends received from a domestic corporation are not U.S. source income if the corporation elects to take the Puerto Rico economic activity credit or the possession tax credit.

Second exception. Part of the dividends received from a foreign corporation is U.S. source income if 25% or more of its total gross income for the 3-year period ending with the close of its tax year preceding the declaration of dividends was effectively connected with a trade or business in the United States. If the corporation was formed less than 3 years before the declaration, use its total gross income from the time it was formed. Determine the part that is U.S. source income by multiplying the dividend by the following fraction.

Table 2-1 Summary of Source Rules for Income of Nonresident Aliens

Personal Services

All wages and any other compensation for services performed in the United States are considered to be from sources in the United States. The only exception to this rule is discussed in chapter 3, under Employees of foreign persons, organizations, or offices.

If your compensation is for personal services performed both inside and outside the United States, you must figure the amount of income that is for services performed in the United States. You usually do this on a time basis. That is, you must include in gross income as U.S. source income the amount that results from multiplying the total amount of compensation by the following fraction.

Example. Jean Blanc, a nonresident alien, is a professional hockey player with a U.S. hockey club. Under Jean's contract, he received $98,500 for 242 days of play during the year. This includes days spent at pre-season training camp, days during the regular season, and playoff game days. Of the 242 days, Jean spent 194 days performing services in the United States and 48 days playing hockey in Canada. Jean's U.S. source income is $78,963, figured as follows:

Reenlistment bonus. A reenlistment bonus received by a nonresident alien for reenlistment in the U.S. Navy while in a foreign country is not U.S. source income.

Crew members. Compensation for services performed by a nonresident alien in connection with the individual's temporary presence in the United States as a regular crew member of a foreign vessel engaged in transportation between the United States and a foreign country or U.S. possession is not U.S. source income.

Transportation Income

Transportation income is income from the use of a vessel or aircraft or for the performance of services directly related to the use of any vessel or aircraft. This is true whether the vessel or aircraft is owned, hired, or leased. The term "vessel or aircraft" includes any container used in connection with a vessel or aircraft.

All income from transportation that begins and ends in the United States is treated as derived from sources in the United States. If the transportation begins or ends in the United States, 50% of the transportation income is treated as derived from sources in the United States.

For transportation income from personal services, 50% of the income is U.S. source income if the transportation is between the United States and a U.S. possession. For nonresident aliens, this only applies to income derived from, or in connection with, an aircraft.

For information on how U.S. source transportation income is taxed, see chapter 4.

Scholarships, Grants, Prizes, and Awards

Generally, the source of scholarships, fellowship grants, grants, prizes, and awards is the residence of the payer regardless of who actually disburses the funds. However, see Activities to be performed outside the United States, later.

For example, payments for research or study in the United States made by the United States, a noncorporate U.S. resident, or a domestic corporation, are from U.S. sources. Similar payments from a foreign government or foreign corporation are foreign source payments even though the funds may be disbursed through a U.S. agent.

Payments made by an entity designated as a public international organization under the International Organizations Immunities Act are from foreign sources.

Activities to be performed outside the United States. Scholarships, fellowship grants, targeted grants, and achievement awards received by nonresident aliens for activities performed, or to be performed, outside the United States are not U.S. source income.

These rules do not apply to amounts paid as salary or other compensation for services. See Personal Services, earlier, for the source rules that apply.

Pensions and Annuities

When you receive a pension from a domestic trust for services performed both in and outside the United States, part of the pension payment is from U.S. sources. That part is the amount attributable to earnings of the trust and the employer contributions made for services performed in the United States. This applies whether the distribution is made under a qualified or nonqualified stock bonus, pension, profit-sharing, or annuity plan (whether or not funded).

If you performed services as an employee of the United States, you may receive a distribution from the U.S. Government under a plan, such as the Civil Service Retirement System, that is treated as a qualified pension plan. Your U.S. source income is the otherwise taxable amount of the distribution that is attributable to your total U.S. Government basic pay other than tax-exempt pay for services performed outside the United States.

Rents or Royalties

Your U.S. source income includes rent and royalty income received during the tax year from property located in the United States or from any interest in that property.

U.S. source income also includes rents or royalties for the use of, or for the privilege of using, in the United States, intangible property such as patents, copyrights, secret processes and formulas, goodwill, trademarks, franchises, and similar property.

Real Property

Real property is land and buildings and generally anything built on, growing on, or attached to land.

Gross income from sources in the United States includes gains, profits, and income from the sale or other disposition of real property located in the United States.

Natural resources. The income from the sale of products of any farm, mine, oil or gas well, other natural deposit, or timber located in the United States and sold in a foreign country, or located in a foreign country and sold in the United States, is partly from sources in the United States. For information on determining that part, see section 1.863-1(b) of the regulations.

Personal Property

Personal property is property, such as machinery, equipment, or furniture, that is not real property.

Gain or loss from the sale or exchange of personal property generally has its source in the United States if you have a tax home in the United States. If you do not have a tax home in the United States, the gain or loss generally is considered to be from sources outside the United States.

Tax home. Your tax home is the general area of your main place of business, employment, or post of duty, regardless of where you maintain your family home. Your tax home is the place where you permanently or indefinitely work as an employee or a self-employed individual. If you do not have a regular or main place of business because of the nature of your work, then your tax home is the place where you regularly live. If you do not fit either of these categories, you are considered an itinerant and your tax home is wherever you work.

Inventory property. Inventory property is personal property that is stock in trade or that is held primarily for sale to customers in the ordinary course of your trade or business. Income from the sale of inventory that you purchased is sourced where the property is sold. Generally, this is where title to the property passes to the buyer. For example, income from the sale of inventory in the United States is U.S. source income, whether you purchased it in the United States or in a foreign country.

Income from the sale of inventory property that you produced in the United States and sold outside the United States (or vice versa) is partly from sources in the United States and partly from sources outside the United States. For information on making this allocation, see section 1.863-3 of the regulations.

These rules apply even if your tax home is not in the United States.

Depreciable property. To determine the source of any gain from the sale of depreciable personal property, you must first figure the part of the gain that is not more than the total depreciation adjustments on the property. You allocate this part of the gain to sources in the United States based on the ratio of U.S. depreciation adjustments to total depreciation adjustments. The rest of this part of the gain is considered to be from sources outside the United States.

For this purpose, "U.S. depreciation adjustments" are the depreciation adjustments to the basis of the property that are allowable in figuring taxable income from U.S. sources. However, if the property is used predominantly in the United States during a tax year, all depreciation deductions allowable for that year are treated as U.S. depreciation adjustments. But there are some exceptions for certain transportation, communications, and other property used internationally.

Gain from the sale of depreciable property that is more than the total depreciation adjustments on the property is sourced as if the property were inventory property, as discussed above.

A loss recognized after January 10, 1999, is sourced in the same way as the depreciation deductions were sourced. However, if the property was used predominantly in the United States, the entire loss reduces U.S. source income. You can choose to apply this rule to losses recognized in tax years beginning after 1986. For details about making this choice, see section 1.865-1T(f)(2) of the regulations.

The basis of property usually means the cost (money plus the fair market value of other property or services) of property you acquire. Depreciation is an amount deducted to recover the cost or other basis of a trade or business asset. The amount you can deduct depends on the property's cost, when you began using the property, how long it will take to recover your cost, and which depreciation method you use. A depreciation deduction is any deduction for depreciation or amortization or any other allowable deduction that treats a capital expenditure as a deductible expense.

Intangible property. Intangible property includes patents, copyrights, secret processes or formulas, goodwill, trademarks, trade names, or other like property. Income from the sale of intangible property that is contingent on the productivity, use, or disposition of the property is sourced in the country where the property is used. If the income is not contingent on the productivity, use, or disposition of the property, the income is sourced according to the seller's tax home as discussed earlier. If payments for goodwill do not depend on its productivity, use, or disposition, their source is the country in which the goodwill was generated.

To the extent gain from the sale of an intangible does not exceed its depreciation adjustments, treat the gain as if the intangible were depreciable personal property, discussed earlier.

Sales through offices or fixed places of business. Despite any of the above rules, if you do not have a tax home in the United States, but you maintain an office or other fixed place of business in the United States, treat the income from any sale of personal property (including inventory property) that is attributable to that office or place of business as U.S. source income. However, this rule does not apply to sales of inventory property for use, disposition, or consumption outside the United States if your office or other fixed place of business outside the United States materially participated in the sale.

If you have a tax home in the United States but maintain an office or other fixed place of business outside the United States, income from sales of personal property, other than inventory, depreciable property, or intangibles, that is attributable to that foreign office or place of business may be treated as U.S. source income. The income is treated as U.S. source income if an income tax of less than 10% of the income from the sale is paid to a foreign country. This rule also applies to losses recognized after January 10, 1999, if the foreign country would have imposed an income tax of less than 10% had the sale resulted in a gain. You can choose to apply this rule to losses recognized in tax years beginning after 1986. For details about making this choice, see section 1.865-1T(f)(2) of the regulations. For stock losses, see section 1.865-2(e) of the regulations.

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