I actually maintain a spreadsheet for exactly this purpose! After getting burned by surprise non-qualified dividends a few years back, I started tracking the treaty status for different countries. The IRS doesn't make it easy, but here are some key resources I've found helpful: 1) Publication 515 (Withholding of Tax on Nonresident Aliens and Foreign Entities) has the most comprehensive treaty information 2) The IRS website has a "United States Income Tax Treaties - A to Z" page that lists all treaties, but you have to dig into each one to see if it includes the information exchange provisions 3) Most importantly, look for treaties that reference "Article 26" or similar language about "Exchange of Information" - that's usually the qualifying provision From my research, countries like Canada, UK, Germany, Netherlands, and most EU countries have the comprehensive treaties that allow OTC stocks to produce qualified dividends. Meanwhile, China, Japan (surprisingly!), and several other Asian countries have basic treaties that don't include the required exchange provisions. One thing that really surprised me was that some countries you'd expect to have comprehensive treaties (like Japan) actually don't for this specific purpose. It's not necessarily correlated with how developed or trustworthy the country is from a trade perspective. Happy to share my spreadsheet template if anyone's interested - just took me forever to compile all this info and would hate for others to have to start from scratch!

This thread has been incredibly enlightening! I've been holding TCEHY for about two years now and just accepted that the dividends were non-qualified without really understanding why. The explanation about China's tax treaty lacking the specific "exchange of information program" provision finally makes it clear. What's particularly frustrating is that this seems like something that should be much more transparent upfront. When you're researching foreign stocks on broker platforms, they'll show you all sorts of data about the company, but nowhere does it clearly indicate "hey, by the way, dividends from this stock will be taxed at your ordinary income rate instead of the preferential rate." For those of us building long-term dividend portfolios, this can significantly impact the after-tax returns. I'm now wondering if I should reconsider some of my Chinese ADR positions and maybe look at alternatives that trade directly on major US exchanges instead of OTC. @Geoff Richards - I'd also love to get a copy of that spreadsheet template if you're willing to share it! Having a clear reference for which countries have qualifying treaties would be invaluable for future investment decisions. It's amazing how much research we have to do ourselves on tax implications that really should be more readily available.

Just to throw in my experience - I skipped filing Form 6251 last year when I had a small ISO exercise (around $6,000 spread) because my calculations showed I owed zero AMT. Got a letter from the IRS three months later asking me to submit the form. Wasn't a full audit or anything, but definitely created extra work I could have avoided.

Based on everyone's experiences here, it sounds like Form 6251 is pretty much required when you have ISO activity, even if you don't owe AMT. I'm dealing with a similar situation - exercised some ISOs last year and trying to figure out the most cost-effective way to handle my taxes. Has anyone tried just preparing the Form 6251 by hand and then entering the results into FreeTaxUSA manually? I'm wondering if that might be a middle-ground approach that avoids the expensive software while still meeting the IRS requirements. The form itself doesn't seem too complex if you have your Form 3921 information handy. Also curious if there are any good resources or guides specifically for calculating AMT on ISOs that don't require expensive software subscriptions?

Don't forget about Form 8949! A lot of new investors miss this. Schedule D is actually a summary form, and Form 8949 is where you list the details. If your 1099-B is complete and accurate (with all cost basis reported to the IRS), you might be able to skip detailed reporting on 8949 and just put the totals directly on Schedule D. But if you have any transactions where the cost basis wasn't reported to the IRS, or if you need to make adjustments to what your broker reported, you'll need to complete Form 8949 as well. FreeTaxUSA should walk you through this, but just be aware of it. For cryptocurrency specifically, most brokers don't report cost basis to the IRS yet, so you'll likely need to report those transactions in a separate section of Form 8949.

As someone who went through this exact nightmare last year with about 80 trades across multiple platforms, I feel your pain! Here's what I wish someone had told me from the start: First, don't panic - FreeTaxUSA really does handle this well once you understand the process. The key thing to remember is that Schedule D is just a summary of your gains and losses, grouped by categories (short-term vs long-term, covered vs non-covered). Here's my step-by-step approach that worked: 1. Download all your 1099-B forms and any supplemental statements from your brokers 2. Separate transactions into the four main buckets: short-term covered, short-term non-covered, long-term covered, long-term non-covered 3. For each bucket, add up total proceeds, total cost basis, and any wash sale adjustments 4. Enter these summary totals into FreeTaxUSA For your crypto transactions, those will likely be in the "non-covered" category since most brokers don't report crypto cost basis to the IRS yet. Make sure to keep those separate from your stock trades. The dividends you mentioned are reported separately on Schedule B, so don't worry about mixing those with your Schedule D calculations. One last tip: double and triple-check that your final totals match exactly what's on your 1099-B forms. Even a penny difference can trigger IRS correspondence later. Take your time - it's better to be accurate than fast!

I was in the same boat last year with tons of mileage from gig work. FreeTaxUSA let me add all my mileage expenses on Schedule C for free. Just make sure you have your total miles driven for business, your total overall miles for the year, and the dates you started and stopped using your car for business. The standard mileage rate is usually the best option unless you have a really expensive car with high maintenance costs.

Just wanted to add that TurboTax Free Edition also supports Schedule C for reporting your 1099-NEC mileage, though they do try to upsell you to their paid version pretty aggressively. I used it last year for my contractor work and it walked me through the mileage deduction step by step. One tip that saved me - when you're entering your vehicle information, make sure you select "started using for business" as the date you actually began doing contract work, not when you bought the car. This affects how much depreciation you can claim if you go the actual expense route instead of standard mileage. Also keep in mind that if you use your car for both personal and business, you can only deduct the business portion. So if you drove 15,000 business miles out of 25,000 total miles, you can only deduct 60% of your car expenses.

Some states have what they call a "convenience rule" too. New York, Nebraska, Connecticut, Delaware, and Pennsylvania have these rules where if your employer is based in their state, they may tax your income even if you're working remotely from another state. It's worth looking into if your employer is based in one of those states!

As someone who travels a lot for work, I've found using a time-tracking app on my phone is super helpful for documenting exactly which days I worked in which states. Makes it way easier come tax time to calculate the percentages. Also, most states have a minimum threshold before you need to file - either income amount or number of days worked there.