Short Answer
German tax residents must fully declare all international investment dividends and capital gains under the comprehensive global income policy. These overseas investment earnings are subject to a flat-rate withholding tax (Abgeltungsteuer) of roughly twenty-five percent plus the solidarity surcharge.
What Most Expats Don't Realize
You maintained a stock trading portfolio with an American brokerage firm and kept your dividend payouts sitting inside that foreign investment account. You didn't know that Germany actively demands a slice of your worldwide capital gains regardless of where the brokerage platform is physically located. Your unlisted global stock earnings were flagged during a routine cross-border data sweep, stuck with automated penalties, and cost you a direct loss of 850 € in avoidable administrative fines.
What To Do
- Check your foreign brokerage statements to see if your home country already deducted a local withholding tax from your payouts.
- Claim up to fifteen percent of that foreign tax paid as a direct credit on your German return to eliminate double taxation.
- "Ich melde meine ausländischen Kapitalerträge zur Versteuerung an." (I am registering my foreign capital gains for taxation.) — enter your international trading summaries onto the mandatory "Anlage KAP" form.
The Truth
Germany relies on the Automatic Exchange of Information system, meaning the local authorities likely already hold records of your foreign investments long before you submit your forms.