IRS form 5471 is a form used for US persons to disclose their ownership in a foreign corporation.
We created these resources to help you file this tax form and what category you may fall under.
A category 5 filer has similarities in definition to category 1, but pertains more to controlled foreign corporations (CFCs). A category 5 filer includes a U.S. shareholder who owns stock in a foreign corporation that is a CFC( at any time during any tax year) and who owned that stock on the last day ofRead More
Category 4 is for U.S. persons who had a majority of the shares of the company (over 50%) or otherwise defined as control of the foreign corporation, during the annual accounting period. As the filer was a significant shareholder of the company with the power to dictate the decision of the foreign corporation, thus theRead More
Category 3 filers outline shareholders who may have met the 10% share ownership threshold of the foreign corporation under various scenarios, but the company may not have been considered a CFC (controlled foreign corporation) or SFC (specified foreign corporation) as pertains to categories 1 & 5, nor does the shareholder have control (over 50% ownership)Read More
Category 2 filers have the least amount of form 5471 requirements among all the filers, as these are defined for only the officers/directors of the foreign corporation (not for shareholder filings). However, they still need to conduct a filing to report the shareholding of U.S. persons throughout the year. A category 2 filer includes aRead More
A category 1 filer includes a U.S. shareholder of a foreign corporation (FC) that is a section 965 specified foreign corporation (SFC) at any time during any tax year of the FC, and who owned that stock on the last day of the year which it was a SFC (taking into account the regulations underRead More
Another form of relief when filing form 5471 for a company with multiple filers (US shareholders and directors/officers) is a single joint filing for form 5471. This greatly reduces the cost of filing this form as many filers with similar requirements can be done at one time. This option is described by the IRS inRead More
Doing business in the 21st century often includes operations done internationally. For these, there are numerous tax returns required to be filed (form 5471, 5472, 8858, 8883, 8886, 8918, 8938, etc.) which are often overlooked by taxpayers every year. With this fact in mind, the government has established procedures for late & non-filers to “catchRead More
A dormant foreign corporation is a type of company which exhibits very minimal operations during a given tax year. This type of dormant company also has minimal foreign assets, activity and no distributions to the US shareholders. Having this classification of a dormant foreign corporation comes with it a very limited informational tax filing ifRead More
The IRS has been cracking down on international taxation in recent years, especially for US persons failing to file their US tax returns back home. With the increasing interconnectivity and sharing of information between countries, not only between governments but also set in regulations for banks, the risk of non-filings for foreign company holdings hasRead More
With a basic understanding of the information and categories in form 5471, the filing requirements can often be a bit overwhelming. Even after identifying which category you and possibly the other US shareholders are in the foreign corporation (FC), there are numerous schedules and separate schedules which must be filed accurately to avoid any formRead More
Form 5471 is a complex IRS tax form to record share ownership in foreign corporations.
