Enter one reconciled disposal and one income summary

What this Australian crypto tax calculator covers

This worksheet handles one simplified capital gains tax event after you have identified the disposed units and converted every relevant amount to Australian dollars. It subtracts cost base and separately entered disposal costs from capital proceeds. A positive amount is then reduced by the capital losses you allocate, before the selected CGT discount is applied. Other net capital gains and a separate ordinary-income amount are added for the tax-rate scenario.

It does not choose which acquisition parcel was disposed, download exchange histories, reconstruct wallet transfers, identify missing transactions or decide whether you are an investor or carrying on a business. It does not apply personal-use-asset rules, non-resident rules, deceased-estate treatment, small business concessions, collectables rules, company treatment, revenue-account trading stock or foreign tax offsets.

Australian tax applies to facts, not to the label used by an exchange. A swap can be a disposal even when no Australian dollars reach a bank account. Paying for goods or services with crypto can also produce a disposal. Moving the same asset between wallets you beneficially own is generally different from transferring ownership, but fees and wrapped, bridged or exchanged assets require careful transaction analysis.

Capital proceeds, cost base and crypto disposals

The Australian Taxation Office treats each crypto asset as a separate CGT asset. A CGT event may happen when you sell crypto for fiat currency, exchange one crypto asset for another, spend it on goods or services, or give it away. The capital proceeds are generally what you receive or the market value of what you receive, expressed in Australian dollars at the relevant time.

Cost base can include money or property given to acquire the asset and certain incidental costs, subject to the CGT rules. Exchange trading fees, brokerage-style charges and some professional costs may be relevant, but the same amount cannot be counted twice. Gas fees can require transaction-specific analysis: a fee associated with acquiring, disposing or merely transferring an asset may not have identical treatment.

The input called disposal costs is provided to prevent an amount omitted from the cost-base field being forgotten. If your cost-base figure already includes all relevant costs, enter zero there. Keep a calculation schedule showing acquisition date, quantity, AUD value, fee, wallet or account and the evidence for each figure.

If the raw result is negative, the calculator shows a current-event capital loss. Capital losses do not directly reduce salary or ordinary staking income. They can generally reduce capital gains under the ordering rules and unused net capital losses may be carried forward. The worksheet does not test loss integrity rules or construct the formal net capital gain calculation across multiple asset categories.

Apply losses before a CGT discount

The general CGT discount may be available to an Australian resident individual or trust for an eligible asset held for at least 12 months. Individuals and trusts generally use a 50% discount, while complying superannuation entities generally use 33⅓%. Companies do not receive the general CGT discount. Eligibility has further conditions, and some events involving foreign residency or affordable housing can alter calculations.

Capital losses are applied before the discount. That ordering is why the calculator first subtracts the loss allocation from the positive event gain and only then multiplies by the undiscounted portion. You can select no discount when the asset was not held long enough, the taxpayer is a company, the gain is on revenue account or another condition prevents the concession.

The “other net capital gains” input must already reflect their own correct process. It is intentionally not mixed into the loss allocation because taxpayers can have choices or restrictions about the order in which losses are applied, and different gains may have different discount eligibility. Prepare a full CGT schedule when there is more than one disposal rather than adding every raw profit to this box.

Do not use the 50% selection simply because you owned “crypto” for more than a year in general. Holding periods attach to the particular asset units disposed. Staking rewards, airdrops, chain splits, swaps, liquidity-pool tokens, wrapping and bridging can create new acquisition times or different assets. Lot identification must be supportable by records.

Keep ordinary crypto income separate

Some crypto receipts may be ordinary income when received. The ATO identifies examples that can include staking rewards and airdrops, depending on the arrangement and taxpayer circumstances. The Australian-dollar market value at receipt can become assessable income and may also become relevant to the cost base when that asset is later disposed. That means one receipt can affect two different moments without being taxed twice on the same economic amount.

The ordinary-income lane accepts a reconciled gross amount and an expense scenario. It does not decide whether an expense is deductible, capital, private or apportioned. Hardware, electricity, software, subscriptions, advice and borrowing costs can have different treatment depending on the activity and nexus to income. A home-office or mining claim may involve record and depreciation rules.

If you are carrying on a crypto trading business, profits may be ordinary income and assets may be trading stock rather than CGT investments. Business status is based on indicators such as purpose, repetition, organisation, scale and commercial manner; frequent transactions alone are not a complete test. Conversely, calling an activity a hobby does not settle the tax analysis.

The combined rate is a scenario input rather than a resident tax-rate engine. Your actual marginal outcome can be affected by total taxable income, Medicare levy, offsets, HELP repayment income, family measures, residency, entity type and the income year. Use the output to set aside cash or compare cases, then calculate the complete return using current rules.

Crypto records the ATO expects you to keep

Retain dates and times of transactions, Australian-dollar values, the nature of each transaction, exchange and wallet details, counterparties where available, receipts, fees and records showing how values were calculated. Keep private records securely; public blockchain data may show a transaction but not the taxpayer, purpose, ownership or Australian-dollar valuation method.

Download exchange statements before accounts close or platforms change formats. Preserve CSV files in their original form and create read-only copies before cleaning data. Export wallet addresses and transaction hashes. Record lost access, scams, failures and theft contemporaneously because tax treatment is not automatically a deductible capital loss.

The ATO generally requires CGT records for at least five years after the relevant event, and acquisition records may therefore need to be retained for many years before and after disposal. If a capital loss is carried forward, keep the records needed to substantiate it until the relevant period after it is used. Business and ordinary-income records can have their own retention requirements.

A practical year-end crypto workflow

First, collect records from every centralised exchange, decentralised protocol and self-custody wallet. Second, normalise asset identifiers and timestamps while preserving raw evidence. Third, link internal transfers and their fees so they are not mistaken for acquisitions or disposals. Fourth, classify sales, swaps, spending, gifts, income receipts and uncertain events.

Next, assign Australian-dollar values using a consistent, supportable source and the relevant transaction time. Reconcile quantities by asset: opening holdings plus acquisitions and receipts, less disposals and outgoing transfers, should explain closing holdings after fees. Investigate negative balances and unmatched transfers rather than allowing software to invent a cost.

Then identify the units disposed and calculate each capital result. Apply current-year and carried-forward capital losses under the correct ordering rules, test discount eligibility, and combine the result with other CGT assets. Separately total ordinary income and allowable deductions. Reconcile the final schedules to the labels and figures used in the return.

Review unusual transactions manually. Liquidity pools, derivatives, perpetual contracts, lending, collateral liquidations, token migrations, wrapped assets, bridging, non-fungible tokens, chain splits, airdrops and decentralised autonomous organisation receipts may not fit a simple spot-trade import. Seek a registered tax agent or legal advice when amounts are material or characterisation is uncertain.

Finally, save the assumptions and a version of any software report. Tax software is a calculation aid, not evidence that classifications and imports are complete. This page is best used as an independent reasonableness check on one reconciled event or a simple scenario before a transaction.