Crypto Tax in Australia: How the ATO Taxes Your Crypto (2026)
For most Australians, the ATO treats cryptocurrency as a capital gains tax (CGT) asset — not as money. That single fact drives almost everything else about how your crypto is taxed. Here’s what you need to know. (This is general information, not tax advice — for your situation, talk to a registered tax agent.)
When you trigger a tax event
A CGT event happens whenever you dispose of a crypto asset. That includes:
- Selling crypto for Australian dollars
- Swapping one crypto for another — yes, crypto-to-crypto trades are taxable, even if no AUD is involved
- Using crypto to buy goods or services
- Gifting crypto to someone else
Each disposal produces a capital gain or loss — the difference between what you paid (your cost base) and the market value in AUD at the time of disposal. Simply buying and holding crypto is not a taxable event, and neither is moving it between your own wallets.
The 50% CGT discount
If you’re an individual (or a trust) and you hold a crypto asset for more than 12 months before disposing of it, you may be entitled to a 50% discount on the capital gain. This is one of the biggest levers Australian investors have — holding for just over a year can halve the taxable gain. Complying super funds get a 33.33% discount; companies get no discount at all.
The personal-use asset exemption (narrow)
There’s a limited exemption where a gain can be disregarded if the crypto is a personal use asset — but the bar is high. It must have been acquired for less than $10,000 and used mainly to buy items for personal use or consumption (not held as an investment or to make a profit). The ATO judges “main use” at the time of disposal, and crypto bought as an investment almost never qualifies. Note too that capital losses on personal use assets are disregarded — you can’t use them to offset other gains.
Staking, airdrops and mining are income
Not everything is CGT. Rewards you receive are generally ordinary income at their market value on the day you receive them:
- Staking rewards — assessable income when received; that value also becomes the cost base for a later CGT event.
- Airdrops of established tokens — income at market value on receipt. (An exception applies to a brand-new token from an initial airdrop with no established market, which is treated under CGT rules instead.)
- Mining or lending interest — generally assessable income, and treated as business income if you’re carrying it on as a business.
Investor vs trader
Most people are investors — they hold for growth and use the CGT rules above (including the discount). If you’re carrying on a business of trading, your crypto is treated as trading stock, profits are ordinary income, and the CGT discount doesn’t apply. Whether you cross that line depends on factors like volume, organisation and intent.
DeFi and wrapped tokens
This trips up a lot of people: the ATO’s position (updated in 2026) is that wrapping or unwrapping a token is a CGT event, and many DeFi lending and liquidity transactions are disposals too, because beneficial ownership of the asset changes. If you’re active in DeFi, assume most on-chain movements have tax consequences and keep detailed records.
Record-keeping and data-matching
You must keep records for five years — the date and AUD value of every transaction, what it was for, the other party, and any exchange or wallet records. This matters because the ATO isn’t guessing: it runs a crypto data-matching program that collects identity and transaction data from Australian exchanges on hundreds of thousands to over a million individuals each year, plus a separate AUSTRAC data-matching program. If it’s on an Australian exchange, assume the ATO can see it.
Making it manageable
Reconciling a year of trades by hand is painful. Dedicated crypto tax software connects to your exchanges and wallets, applies the ATO rules (including the 50% discount and personal-use logic), and produces a myTax-ready report. We review the main options — including Australian-built tools — in our crypto tax software comparison. The Australian income year runs 1 July to 30 June, with self-lodgers generally due by 31 October (later if you use a registered tax agent).
General information only — not financial or tax advice. Tax outcomes depend on your circumstances; consult a registered tax agent. Rules and ATO guidance change.
General information only — not financial or tax advice. Verified 2026-07-31; details can change.