Japan crypto tax: the 55% problem, and why your US exchange will drop you when you move

The short version. Once you become a Japan tax resident, Japan treats your crypto gains as miscellaneous income (雑所得) — taxed at progressive rates that reach roughly 55% including residence tax. There is no separate 20% rate like listed stocks get, and no carrying losses forward. On the US side, long-term capital gains top out around 23.8% federal — so the same coin can be taxed more than twice as hard depending on when and where you sell. On top of that, US exchanges like Coinbase and Kraken increasingly won’t serve Japan residents. If you hold crypto and you’re moving, the decisions to make happen before you land, not after.

I don’t trade crypto myself — but I did live the sibling version of this problem. When I moved from the US to Japan, I had to force-sell about ¥10M of NISA mutual funds because a non-resident can’t keep them, and US tax rules (PFIC) made holding them radioactive anyway. Crypto is the same shape of trap: a jurisdiction change quietly rewrites the tax and access rules on assets you already own. English-language coverage of this is genuinely thin, so here’s what I found when I dug in — research and lived pattern, not tax advice.

Why Japan’s 55% is so much worse than US capital gains

In the US, if you hold an asset over a year, long-term capital gains are taxed at 0%, 15%, or 20% federally, plus a possible 3.8% Net Investment Income Tax — a ceiling around 23.8%. Crypto gets that same favourable treatment.

Japan does the opposite. Crypto gains are miscellaneous income, stacked on top of your salary and taxed at Japan’s progressive scale:

Taxable income (JPY)	Combined rate (national + 10% residence)
up to ¥1.95M	15%
¥1.95M–¥3.3M	20%
¥3.3M–¥6.95M	30%
¥6.95M–¥9M	33%
¥9M–¥18M	43%
¥18M–¥40M	50%
over ¥40M	55%

Three things make this brutal:

• It stacks on your other income. A ¥8M salary already puts you in the 33–43% band, so even a modest crypto profit is taxed at that marginal rate — not at some gentle “investment” rate.
• No flat 20% rate for individuals — yet. Listed stocks in Japan are taxed at a flat 20.315%. Crypto is not. (A 2026 FIEA amendment — enacted by the Diet on July 15, 2026 (source) — creates a 20% flat rate for “specified crypto assets” on Japan-registered exchanges, but the individual effective date is only projected for January 1, 2028 — confirm against current NTA guidance — and it wouldn’t cover foreign exchanges, DeFi, staking, or NFTs. Assume 55% governs everything you do until the NTA says otherwise.)
• No loss carryforward. A crypto loss can only offset other miscellaneous income in the same year. You can’t carry it to next year, and you can’t use it against salary. A bad year is just gone.

On a $100,000 long-term gain, the difference between realizing at a US ~23.8% rate and realizing as a high-bracket Japan resident (say 50%) is on the order of $26,000 — for doing the exact same sale a few months apart on opposite sides of a move.

What actually counts as a taxable event in Japan

This is where US-based readers get caught. In Japan, far more than “selling for cash” triggers tax:

Event	Taxable in Japan?
Sell crypto for yen (or any fiat)	✅ Yes
Swap one crypto for another (BTC → ETH)	✅ Yes
Spend crypto on goods or services	✅ Yes
Receive mining / staking rewards	✅ Yes (as income at receipt)
Buy crypto with fiat	❌ No
Move crypto between your own wallets	❌ No

Crypto-to-crypto and spending crypto both count. If you buy a coffee with Bitcoin that’s appreciated, Japan sees a disposal and wants tax on the gain. Cost basis is tracked by the moving-average or total-average method, which you elect. And because Japan taxes residents on worldwide income, a gain on Coinbase or Kraken is fully Japan-taxable even though the exchange isn’t Japanese.

The exchange problem: your US platform may not let you stay

Japan’s Payment Services Act requires any exchange serving Japanese users to register with the FSA as a Crypto-Asset Exchange Service Provider. As of April 2025 there were 32 registered providers, and the FSA has been actively pushing unlicensed foreign platforms out (including via app stores).

The practical result for a US person moving over: US and global exchanges commonly restrict or close accounts for Japan-resident users. When I checked, the pattern looked like this — Coinbase not opening accounts for Japan residents, Kraken listing Japan as restricted, Gemini not available, Bybit pulling back. But policies change constantly, and I can’t promise any specific platform’s status on the day you move. Confirm your own exchange’s current terms directly before you rely on it — the failure mode is landing in Japan and finding you can no longer trade, withdraw easily, or even log in normally.

This connects to a wider access problem: your US financial life is pinned to a US phone number and address. I write about that in keeping a US brokerage when moving to Japan and the W-8BEN vs W-9 question after you move — crypto exchanges are just the least forgiving version of it.

The US side does not disappear

If you’re a US citizen or green-card holder, moving to Japan does not end your IRS obligations. You still report worldwide gains. A few moving parts:

• Reporting keeps flowing. New Form 1099-DA started for US brokers/exchanges in tax year 2025 — the IRS now sees more of your crypto activity, not less.
• FBAR is unsettled for crypto. FinCEN Notice 2020-2 said a foreign account holding only virtual currency wasn’t FBAR-reportable, and that guidance was still operative when I checked — but proposed rulemaking could change it. Treat this as needs-current-confirmation, not a settled rule.
• Form 8938 (FATCA): Thresholds for filers living abroad are $200,000 on the last day of the year / $300,000 at any point (single), higher for married-filing-jointly (IRS FATCA summary). Many practitioners report crypto on foreign exchanges here out of caution even absent a bright-line rule.

Because these rules are genuinely in motion, this is one area where a cross-border preparer earns their fee. One place to start is Taxes for Expats, a US–Japan expat tax firm — it’s not the only option, and you should compare, but the linked referral gives $25 off your first filing. (Full disclosure: that TFX link is a referral — I get a small credit if you file through it, and you get $25 off. Use it or don’t; the decision should be about fit, not my link.)

The one decision to make before you move

Here’s the axis worth raising with a preparer before you establish Japan tax residency (which generally begins around your arrival with intent to reside):

• If you hold large unrealized long-term gains and expect a high-income year in Japan → realizing while still a US resident locks in US long-term rates (~23.8% max federal) instead of carrying the gain into a system that can tax it up to 55% as ordinary income.
• If your gains are small, or you’d be selling into a bad market just to beat a deadline → the tax saving can be swamped by market-timing risk. Selling for tax reasons is still selling; you give up future upside and eat transaction costs.
• Either way → map when Japan residency starts for your situation, because that date is the switch between the two tax worlds.

I want to be explicit: this is an axis to discuss, not a recommendation to sell. I’m not licensed, and the right answer depends on your income, your state, and numbers I can’t see. My own bias, after living the forced-sale of my NISA funds, is toward not owning assets tied to a jurisdiction I’m about to leave — but that’s a philosophy, not advice for your portfolio.

FAQ

Can I use Coinbase in Japan?

When I researched this, Japan residents generally could not open Coinbase accounts, and several other US/global exchanges restricted or closed Japan-resident accounts because they aren’t registered with Japan’s FSA. This changes often, so confirm your specific exchange’s current policy directly before you move rather than assuming last year’s status still holds.

Does Japan really tax crypto at 55%?

At the top, yes — crypto gains are miscellaneous income taxed at progressive national rates up to 45% plus 10% residence tax, reaching about 55%, and stacked on your other income. Most people won’t hit the very top bracket, but even middle earners land in the 30–43% range, far above the US long-term capital-gains rate. A projected 20% flat rate for domestic-exchange assets isn’t expected to apply to individuals until 2028 at the earliest — the FIEA amendment was enacted by the Diet on July 15, 2026; confirm the implementation date against current NTA guidance.

I’m a US citizen — do I file in both countries?

Generally yes. You report worldwide gains to the IRS regardless of where you live, and Japan taxes you as a resident on the same gains, with the US–Japan tax treaty and foreign tax credits meant to reduce double taxation. Because crypto FBAR/FATCA treatment is actively changing, this is worth confirming with a cross-border professional — and it’s the same double-filing reality I cover in your first tax year after leaving the US and PFIC rules on Japanese funds for US persons.