It is complicated and here's how it gets complicated.
You buy Bitcoin and sell it back to AUD - it's easy!
You buy Bitcoin, move it to exchange, Buy XRP with Bitcoin and then sell it to Ethereum, move it back to Fiat exchange and sell it - this is where it gets complicated!
You need to know
- Which of above transactions done above are taxable
- The exact dollar value price (cost basis) at that instance of your trade
- Process of calculating it.
Here's how it has to be calculated
- AUD - BTC - buy BTC with AUD
- BTC - BTC (Exchange transfer - not taxable)
- BTC - XRP (Sell BTC to AUD at that instance and buy XRP with AUD)
- XRP - ETH (Sell XRP to AUD at that instance and buy ETH with AUD)
- ETH - ETH (Exchange transfer --not taxable)
- ETH - AUD (Sell ETH to AUD)
For all of these calculations, you need to maintain exchange rates with respect to AUD at that exact timestamp.
Now, do it sound Not Complicated?
To do all this, CRA will charge by the hours they spend on this either using spreadsheets or tools. and that could amount to more than 500AUD.
So our friends have built a tool BearTax, which can integrate securely with various exchanges including major ones like Coinbase, Gemini, QuadrigaCX, Binance and more, fetch all your transactions and calculate your taxable gain/loss in minutes.
Everything for free. You pay only after you see gainloss information to get detailed list of taxable transactions and that too just starting 0.99 USD!
I'm associated with BearTax as a platform tester and been very happy with the platform.