If you keep it Orca, how long do you need to keep it before you do not pay tax?
You will always pay tax jaDEB. If you sell before the 3 year holding term, all your gains are added to your income. If you sell after the 3 year term, 33.3% of your gains are added to your income.
The mystery is this. According to SARS website, if you were classed as a trader by selling and buying before the 3 year term then hold for 10 years then your stocks are still regarded as trading stock and will be taxed accordingly.
To change your stocks to long term Capital Assets, you need to "regard" your stocks as "sold" even if you don't sell them and pay the tax due at 100% of the gains added to your income. Your Base cost will then be at the market value at the end of that day. (I presume)
Problem now is that if you were a Trader and then changed your intention to be an investor, you would have sold the stocks prior to this anyway and paid the tax, then this date of new purchase should be the start of the 3year holding period in my view but unfortunately SARS is not clear on this.
Hope you get what I mean.
