Old holdings: the clock that already ran out
Cryptoassets acquired before 1 March 2021 stayed under the old law when the new regime arrived: private speculation rules with a one-year holding period. That year has long expired for all old stock — a sale today is simply tax-free, however large the gain. Everything acquired from 1 March 2021 onward is new stock and carries the 27.5% with no holding period at all.
The point is not the rule but the proof. What is tax-free is not "some" bitcoin — it is the bitcoin whose pre-cutoff acquisition is documented. Mix old and new stock in one wallet and, in doubt, the worse classification as new stock looms — 27.5% on a gain that would have been free. Separate wallets, purchase records from the time, unbroken transfer chains: the old-stock proof is the most valuable document in an Austrian crypto portfolio, nearly impossible to reconstruct years later and entirely possible to secure today.
The swap: deferral, not a gift
Since the 2022 reform, exchanging one cryptocurrency directly for another is tax-neutral — BTC for ETH, ETH into a stablecoin, all without a taxable event. The cost basis of the coin given up travels onto the coin received. Realisation waits for the exit from the crypto world: sale into euros, paying for goods or services, conversion to fiat.
Two honest footnotes. First: this is a deferral effect. The gain does not vanish — it travels, and at the euro exit the entire accumulated appreciation falls due at once. Anyone who has rotated tax-free for years should know the latent tax number before triggering it in a single day. Second: neutrality covers cryptocurrencies within the statutory definition. NFTs and tokens without the medium-of-exchange character fall outside — a "swap" into an NFT is not a neutral rotation but, case by case, a taxable event.
In this site's US chapter, every swap is a sale. In Austria it is not — until the euro. The same trading history produces entirely different tax years in the two systems.
The moving average: the third rule in the bundle
For new stock, the moving average price has been mandatory since 1 January 2023 — per wallet, per cryptocurrency. Every purchase shifts the average; every disposal computes against it. There is no FIFO election and no lot-picking within new stock. Combined with swap neutrality this means: cost-basis bookkeeping runs silently across years and dozens of rotations — and must be correct to the cent at the euro exit. Past a handful of transactions, that is software work, not spreadsheet work.
What to do
- Make old stock provable now. Secure pre-March-2021 purchase records, exchange statements and chain data, and separate that stock into dedicated wallets — before an inquiry, not after.
- Track the latent tax. After every rotation chain, know the travelling average cost. The euro exit is the moment of truth — plan it rather than experience it.
- Check NFT and derivative detours separately. Whatever falls outside the crypto definition leaves the neutrality. Clarify before "swapping" into non-cryptocurrencies.
- Tools, not tables. Per-wallet moving averages across years and platforms is software territory. Build the reconstruction once, cleanly — it carries every later year, and every later correction.
This page explains computational rules. It is not advice on your transactions, and reading it creates no professional relationship.