Capital Gearing Share Discussion Threads

[gengulphus] 18/1/2018 04:32

Gengulphus can you or anyone else provide any information whether the liquidation of CLLN today (my largest long term holding) means that they immediately qualify as having negligible value for shareholders and that those not held in an ISA can be used as a CGT loss within this tax year?

No, I cannot, not for certain - but it looks very likely to me. See later sections of this reply.

I have gone round in circles this morning looking through HMRC's CGT manual and am none the wiser for my efforts. ...

I rather suspect that's because you've gone to the CGT manual as your first resort - not a good idea because you're liable to get lost in the mass of detail, as looks to have happened. It's generally best to look at the simpler, more taxpayer-friendly introductory material first, study it thoroughly, then fall back on the CGT manual if still needed - it quite possibly won't be, and if it is, the study of the introductory material will at least give you a basic idea of what's going on, which is quite important when finding your way around the taxman-oriented manual.

In this case, I found that a simple internet search for "negligible value" quickly led me to HMRC's Helpsheet on negligible value claims:

I should add to that the introductory material may well be lacking information that puts what it does say in context - so try to avoid reading more into it than it actually says. For example, in this case it says that "You cannot make a negligible value claim after the company has been dissolved." Which is basically true: you cannot do that - but don't read "if you wait until after the company has been dissolved, you're out of luck" into it: the truth is that when the company is dissolved, its shares cease to exist, so you cease to own them. That counts as an actual disposal of the shares, actually realising the loss on the date of dissolution. So you no longer need "to be treated as though you had sold the asset and immediately reacquired it", which is the effect of a (successful) negligible value claim according to the introductory material. And it would create thorough conceptual confusion for you to be treated as having sold something that neither you nor anyone else owns and indeed doesn't even exist - which together with not giving opportunities to waste everybody's time is presumably the reason not to allow such claims. So you can actually still get the benefit of the loss - indeed, you no longer have any choice about getting it, other than by failing to tell the taxman about it within the further "end of the 4th tax year after the one in which it was realised" deadline that applies to all actually-realised losses. It's just that a negligible value claim is no longer either needed or even allowed as part of getting that benefit.

... Also does anyone know the link for HMRC's list showing shares of negligible value and how long it normally takes for them to appear on it?

- but note what it says about what it is: "shares formerly quoted on the London Stock Exchange which have been declared as Negligible Value up to 31 December 2017". It doesn't cover shares not formerly quoted on the London Stock Exchange, and in practice that doesn't seem to include any AIM shares - I suspect that's a technicality either about whether AIM is technically part of the London Stock Exchange or about what exactly "quoted" means technically. (This isn't of course relevant to Carillion, which was quoted on the main market, but it's an important part of understanding what the list is - in particular, one can make a negligible value claim and have it accepted without the share ever appearing on the list, and indeed, I suspect that that's what happens to most negligible value claims - they're probably about collapsed private companies...)

It also doesn't cover shares not yet declared (presumably meaning declared by HMRC) to be of negligible value - and the process of declaring a share to be of negligible value will almost certainly take some time. I've no idea just how much, though, other than that the signs are that it only happens in response to someone making a negligible value claim and having it accepted by HMRC. Carillion is prominent enough that I expect a negligible value claim to be made about it quite quickly, and looks like an open-and-shut case to me, that HMRC should be able to investigate and rule on comparatively quickly, so I would expect a declaration that Carillion is of negligible value to be as rapid as such declarations ever are. But HMRC's processes are often very slow by modern standards, so that isn't necessarily saying all that much!

Thanks in advance for any help as share sales already made for this tax year have now been thrown into total disarray as I have already sold some at a loss in order to offset the planned sale of either a Buy to Let flat, or some other profitable shares if the flat sale doesn't complete by the end of this tax year.

No, share sales already made for this tax year have not been thrown into total disarray, because you're under no obligation to make a negligible value claim about Carillion for this tax year, nor to use the date on which HMRC first accept that the shares were of negligible value if and when you finally do make a negligible value claim. (Indeed, in cases other than "shares formerly quoted on the London Stock Exchange", you wouldn't have any real way of knowing what that date is!)

They will be thrown into total disarray if you make a negligible value claim about Carillion for this tax year, but the solution to that is obvious: don't make such a claim! And they will be thrown into total disarray if Carillion is dissolved this tax year, but unless the timescale of liquidations is much shorter than that of administrations, that seems extremely unlikely to me...

Further to the above query - PWC who have been appointed as liquidators for CLLN have stated in their announcement today "Unfortunately, as a result of the liquidation appointments, there is no prospect of any return to shareholders." Does this mean that I can utilise the entire cost of my CLLN shareholding purchase for purposes of CGT losses to offset against gains with immediate effect this tax year?

I can't be absolutely certain what HMRC will accept as sufficient evidence for a negligible value claim, but that statement by the liquidator does look to me like very good evidence that the introductory material's statement that "An asset is of negligible value if it is worth next to nothing" applies. So yes, I think a negligible value claim would be successful, and if so, yes, you'll have bought the Carillion shares for their entire allowable cost and be treated as having sold them for nothing, so will be treated as realising a loss of their entire allowable cost which you offset against your gains this tax year. But I cannot guarantee that HMRC will accept it as conclusive evidence that the claim is valid. Only HMRC can do that, and within its limits, that's what they do in the negligible value list.

Not "can offset", by the way - once you realise losses or are treated as realising them, you must offset them against gains you've realised in the same tax year as far as possible, and if there are further losses after all the gains have been offset, you then must carry those losses forward into the next tax year. I.e. essentially, the decision you make about whether to make the negligible value claim is the last one you make that affects the result of the CGT calculations: everything after that is a matter of doing the CGT calculations correctly, not of changing what their result should be.

Gengulphus

[investoree] 15/1/2018 11:06

Further to the above query - PWC who have been appointed as liquidators for CLLN have stated in their announcement today "Unfortunately, as a result of the liquidation appointments, there is no prospect of any return to shareholders." Does this mean that I can utilise the entire cost of my CLLN shareholding purchase for purposes of CGT losses to offset against gains with immediate effect this tax year?

[investoree] 15/1/2018 09:51

Gengulphus can you or anyone else provide any information whether the liquidation of CLLN today (my largest long term holding) means that they immediately qualify as having negligible value for shareholders and that those not held in an ISA can be used as a CGT loss within this tax year?

I have gone round in circles this morning looking through HMRC's CGT manual and am none the wiser for my efforts. Also does anyone know the link for HMRC's list showing shares of negligible value and how long it normally takes for them to appear on it?

Thanks in advance for any help as share sales already made for this tax year have now been thrown into total disarray as I have already sold some at a loss in order to offset the planned sale of either a Buy to Let flat, or some other profitable shares if the flat sale doesn't complete by the end of this tax year.

[geordy2] 13/1/2018 19:37

Gengulphus

Many thanks for such a clear and concise response.

You should be charging for this service, I am really appreciative of your efforts.

Regards

G2

[gbh2] 13/1/2018 17:46

Handykart- Thank you, seems to be fine now.

[gengulphus] 12/1/2018 19:04

geordy2,

I have a gain in the current tax year which is less than £5000. I also have a carried forward loss from a previous year of £7000. Will this years gain be offset against the previous loss, ...

No. Same-year losses have to be offset against gains all the way down to the remaining gains being zero, but losses brought forward from previous tax years only have to be offset against gains until the remaining gains are down to the CGT allowance. (Or in both cases, until the losses concerned have run out, of course.)

... and do I even need to show the c/f loss or save it for next year when hopefully my gain will be in excess of the CGT allowance.

Technically, I believe the £7k loss is brought forward from the 2016/2017 tax year into the current 2017/2018 tax year, during which it is not used, and so then gets carried forward again into the 2018/2019 tax year. (Assuming you do actually mean the current tax year - if you instead mean the tax year whose return is due at the end of this month and that you are therefore currently working on, subtract 1 from all those year numbers!)

Note that I say that the £7k loss is brought forward from the 2016/2017 tax year rather than just "a previous tax year". That's because if it originally arose in say the 2014/2015 tax year, the same principle says that it will first have been carried forward unchanged into 2015/2016, then carried forward unchanged again into 2016/2017, then carried forward unchanged yet again into 2017/2018, resulting in the above happening.

And for a similar reason, I say that the loss is carried forward into the 2018/2019 tax year, not just "a future tax year".

As to what you show on the tax return concerned, it depends on whether you have to fill in the capital gains section at all.

If you don't (and I don't see any reason why you definitely do in what you've told us, but there might be in details you haven't told us, e.g. if the size of the £5k gain depends on making a CGT claim), then you don't have to say anything at all. Personally, though, I would stick something in an additional information box somewhere saying something like "I do not need to fill in the capital gains section, but I have £7,000 allowable losses brought forward from [year of the last tax return that described them]. None of them are used and they are not added to in 2017/2018, so they are carried forward into 2018/2019." That makes "what were these losses???" questions from the taxman less likely, and also could be a useful reminder to yourself about where the details can be found.

If you do have to fill in the capital gains section, I would answer the questions it poses about brought-forward and carried-forward losses on the above basis - i.e. that £7k is brought forward from the preceding tax year, none of it is used during the tax year, and so £7k is carried forward into the following tax year.

Having said all that, if someone has filled in a past tax return by not saying anything at all about brought-forward losses that are neither used nor added to, I can hardly see them getting into trouble about it. It makes no difference to the tax due and at worst, they've suffered an understandable misunderstanding about what's expected and in the fairly unlikely event that the taxman picks up on an apparent inconsistency and asks for an explanation, might have to explain the exact situation behind their answers.

Gengulphus

[geordy2] 11/1/2018 19:58

I have a gain in the current tax year which is less than £5000. I also have a carried forward loss from a previous year of £7000. Will this years gain be offset against the previous loss, and do I even need to show the c/f loss or save it for next year when hopefully my gain will be in excess of the CGT allowance.

Regards

G2

[handykart] 10/1/2018 20:45

cgtcalculator.com seems to be working ok now.

[gbh2] 09/1/2018 13:56

Anyone know why the cgt calculator on: cgtcalculator.com is no longer working?

[yes yes] 09/1/2018 09:22

thanks Gengulphus..
Converting the data from cgt to stonebanks works fine and the new format comes out but after that i enter the converted data into item 2 (assuming that's what i need to do?) No relevant data seems to come out & Java is enabled..
Does anyone know how to use Stonebanks with converted data from cgt cal?

I'm assuming stonebanks is working?

[gengulphus] 09/1/2018 08:27

yes yes,

doesn't appear to be working,hopefully this is a temporary blip but is there a way of quickly transfering the data from cgt calculator to stonebanks?

Yes, there appears to be a way to transfer the data - see items 5 & 6 on (and item 4 if you want to move data the other way).

Can't guarantee "quickly" or anything else about how well it does the job - I've never used it, I simply remembered having see something along those lines years ago and so took a look.

Gengulphus

[handykart] 08/1/2018 20:12

Having same problem. Was working ok last night.

[yes yes] 08/1/2018 17:52

doesn't appear to be working,hopefully this is a temporary blip but is there a way of quickly transfering the data from cgt calculator to stonebanks?

[orchestralis] 08/1/2018 13:08

Is anybody else having problems with the cgtcalculator in the header? I get the following error. thanks.

HTTP Error 500.19 - Internal Server Error

[asif12] 08/12/2017 11:36

THanks for your replies

[gengulphus] 04/12/2017 19:44

amalanchier3,

Good point about the possibility of the issuing country being the UK - I'll edit in a mention of that point. As to which UK coins that applies to, you're probably right but I've no personal knowledge about it, so I'll leave you/others to give answers on that point.

Gengulphus

[amalanchier3] 04/12/2017 19:02

Hi Gengulphus

My understanding is that Sovereigns and Britannias are legal tender in the UK and are therefore free of UK CGT.

A

[gengulphus] 04/12/2017 16:45

asif12,

I've no experience of buying and selling gold, of dealing with tax on anyone else's dealings in gold, or of using BullionVault, so the following is only my best guesses based on general knowledge of CGT.

I know of no reason why CGT should treat gold specially, and a quick look through likely sections of HMRC's Capital Gains manual didn't reveal one. So I think that normal CGT rules would apply.

They would indicate that if what you own is one or more specific pieces of gold, each one of them possibly jointly with other people, then after any one of them is sold, you (and its co-owners if any) would need to determine the gain or loss on that specific item - what it was sold for minus that specific item's acquisition cost (i.e. what it was bought for) and all of its other allowable costs. Also, the chattels exemption might apply, or if the physical objects are coins that are currently legal tender in the country that issued them, they would be treated as foreign currency or (edit) as UK currency (which is exempt from CGT) if the issuing country is the UK.

If on the other hand what you own is "X grams of gold held with BullionVault", with nothing linking that to ownership of specific physical items, then I suspect that technically, you don't own physical gold at all, but rather derivative securities entitling you to receive the market value of grams of physical gold held by BullionVault (or their custodian). And unless those securities have serial numbers or something similar that allows you to distinguish one of them from another and track their ownership individually, the share identification rules should apply to calculating gains/losses on them when they are sold.

But as I said above, this is all guesswork - hopefully, informed guesswork, but guesswork nevertheless...

Gengulphus

[asif12] 28/11/2017 11:13

Hi,

Does anyone know the tax liabilities of buying and selling gold using BullionVault?

[finkwot] 18/10/2017 11:01

Thank you very much. I shall follow your links and digest it all. I'll also have to look further into the IHT aspect of the second question.

[who r u who r u] 24/9/2017 05:56

would be very grateful if someone can tell me what forms need to filled in for our SAR when disposing of overseas shares,in Particular the TSX and ASX (not the usa).

Thanks in advance

[jaz36] 20/9/2017 10:21

Dropped by 4% on 15th Sept. but partially recovered since. Quite unusual as normally not volatile. Maybe net asset value affected by drop in U.S. bonds.