Should you report foreign stocks in ITR as per calendar year?

Foreign investments are required to be disclosed in schedule foreign assets (FA) as per calendar year, unlike all other disclosures that are done as per the financial year. This would mean that for the assessment year 2023, taxpayers should have declared foreign investments done between 1 January 2022 and 31 December 2022 in their income tax return (ITR).

- Shipra Singh

Delhi-based Akhil (who declined to give his second name) did just that. He declared all his foreign stocks bought until 31 December 2022 and left out those bought in February this year. But, when he claimed a refund on the ₹20,000 TCS (tax collection at source) that was deducted on the stocks that he bought in February, it led to a discrepancy. “I got an intimation from the I-T department that said the gross receipt/income against which tax has been deducted at source has to be entered in the relevant schedule. My CA (chartered accountant) did not find any such irregularity except the foreign stocks bought after 31 December 2022 that I did not disclose. The CA has revised the ITR and disclosed those stocks too," he said.