The short answer
Australia has no fixed-day wash-sale rule for crypto. There is no equivalent of the UK's 30-day matching or Canada's 61-day superficial loss window, and there is no statutory period after which a repurchase becomes automatically safe.
What exists instead is a purpose-based analysis. The ATO has published guidance treating wash sales as a form of tax avoidance addressed by the general anti-avoidance provisions, where an asset is disposed of and a substantially similar position is reacquired, and the sole or dominant purpose of the arrangement is to obtain a tax benefit.
Do not state or rely on a fictional fixed-day rule in either direction. Waiting 31 days does not immunise a transaction whose dominant purpose was the tax benefit, and repurchasing quickly is not automatically fatal where the arrangement has a genuine commercial purpose.
What the general anti-avoidance analysis looks at
The relevant statutory framework asks whether there was a scheme, whether a tax benefit was obtained, and whether it would be concluded that a party entered into the scheme for the sole or dominant purpose of obtaining that benefit — assessed objectively, on matters including the manner in which the scheme was carried out, its form and substance, its timing, and the change in the taxpayer's financial position.
Applied to a loss realisation, the questions become practical:
- Did the taxpayer's economic exposure actually change, or was the position restored?
- Was the disposal timed by reference to the tax year rather than to market conditions?
- Would the taxpayer have done this absent the tax outcome?
- Is there a documented non-tax reason?
What a genuine transaction looks like
Facts pointing toward a real disposal include: a genuine change in exposure, held for a meaningful period; a documented investment reason such as rebalancing, risk reduction, or a change of thesis; a repurchase decision made on later information rather than planned at the time of sale; and a price difference reflecting real market movement between the transactions.
Facts pointing the other way include: sale and repurchase at effectively the same price within a very short interval; a pre-arranged plan to restore the position; timing clustered at year end with no other explanation; and disposals to an associate or an entity you control, where the asset never really left the group.
Which rules actually do have fixed mechanics
Two things Australian taxpayers should not confuse with a wash-sale rule.
Capital loss quarantining. Capital losses offset capital gains, not ordinary income, and unused losses are carried forward indefinitely for individuals. Losses are applied against gains before the CGT discount is applied — an ordering point that materially affects the result and is often reversed in software.
Personal use assets. Capital losses on personal use assets are disregarded entirely. Where a taxpayer has argued that an asset was a personal use asset, that argument removes the loss as well as the gain.
Neither of these is a timing rule. They constrain what a loss can do, not when it can be realised.
Company and trust losses
Where cryptoassets are held through a company or trust, loss recoupment is subject to its own tests — continuity of ownership and business continuity for companies, and the trust loss provisions for trusts. A change in ownership or activity can prevent losses from being used at all.
These are structural rules that have nothing to do with wash-sale analysis and that catch taxpayers restructuring after a loss year.
Worked example
Two taxpayers each hold a token with a large unrealised loss in June.
The first sells on 28 June and repurchases on 2 July at essentially the same price, having planned both transactions together, with no change in exposure and no stated reason beyond the loss. The pattern is precisely what the anti-avoidance guidance describes, and the loss is at risk.
The second sells on 15 May after concluding the position no longer fits their strategy, remains out of the asset for several months, and repurchases in October after a specific development changes their view, at a materially different price. The documented reasoning and the real change in exposure make this a different arrangement, whatever the calendar interval.
Note that the second taxpayer's protection comes from the substance and the record, not from the number of days.
What to document
For any realised loss of significance: the date and reasoning for the disposal, written at the time; the market conditions or portfolio considerations behind it; whether a repurchase was contemplated and on what basis; and, if a repurchase occurs, what changed.
A contemporaneous note is the difference between an arrangement with a commercial explanation and one that looks purely tax-driven in hindsight.
What changes this answer
- The dominant purpose, assessed objectively.
- Whether economic exposure genuinely changed.
- Whether an associate or controlled entity acquired the position.
- Capital versus revenue account, which changes the framework entirely.
- Entity type and the applicable loss recoupment tests.
- The income year and current ATO guidance.
Related HolderTax pages
- Australian CGT events for crypto, including swaps and wrapping
- ATO data matching: read the deadline on your own letter
- Wash-sale analysis and digital assets (United States)
Evidence note
Derived from the general anti-avoidance provisions of Australian tax law and published ATO guidance on wash sales. Not professionally reviewed. This page states no fixed-day safe period, because none exists in Australian law for this purpose. Where a material loss is being realised near year end, obtain Australian professional advice before executing rather than afterwards.