How crypto taxation works in Switzerland.

Swiss crypto tax reporting usually comes down to three separate questions: what you held at year-end, what income you received, and whether any realised trading result needs to be documented. The answer depends on your personal tax status and the completeness of your transaction history.

1. Crypto holdings are declared as wealth

Crypto assets held on 31 December are part of taxable wealth. In practice, the key number is the year-end value in CHF for each asset you still hold. Where official tax values are available, taxpayers commonly use published reference values such as ICTax values.

If you hold assets across several exchanges and wallets, you need a consolidated year-end position. Transfers between your own wallets should not be treated as sales, but they do affect where acquisition history is stored.

2. Private capital gains are different from income

For Swiss private individuals, gains from private assets are generally treated differently from income. This is why it is important to separate realised gain/loss calculations from taxable income such as staking, lending, salary paid in crypto, mining-like rewards, or professional trading activity.

If you are treated as a professional trader or operate through a legal entity, the analysis can change significantly. Complex cases should be reviewed with a qualified Swiss tax advisor.

3. Staking and rewards should be separated

Staking rewards, earn products, interest, lending income, and similar reward events should not be mixed into private capital gains. They are usually documented as income at a CHF value, based on the information available from the exchange export and market references.

4. FIFO history helps explain disposals

When you sell or swap crypto, a tax report should show which acquisition lots were used to calculate the disposal result. FIFO, or first in first out, is a practical way to reconcile acquisition history against disposals. Missing purchases can create unmatched disposals and unreliable realised results.

5. Keep the supporting records

A clean annex is not just a number at the end. It should include transaction sources, asset-level summaries, year-end holdings, staking income, realised results, notes about incomplete history, and a ledger that can be reviewed by you or your advisor.