Your coins are wealth, not income. That is the whole filing.
Bitcoin is declared as private wealth in the Wertschriften- und Guthabenverzeichnis at its 31 December value in CHF. You name the coin, enter the CHF value under übrige Guthaben, and attach a year-end wallet or exchange printout that shows the quantity.
TL;DR
- Bitcoin goes in the Wertschriften- und Guthabenverzeichnis under übrige Guthaben, coin named, quantity stated (Kanton ZH Steuerbuch ZStB 16.5).
- Value it at the 31 December market price. For Bitcoin, use the ESTV ICTax Kursliste year-end rate. Check ICTax for the year rather than trusting a quoted figure.
- Private capital gains are tax-free (DBG Art. 16 Abs. 3). Wealth tax applies annually. Income tax applies to mining, staking, airdrops, and Bitcoin salary at receipt.
- Self-custody and exchange holdings are declared the same way. Attach a year-end printout as proof.
- Deadlines are cantonal. Only Zurich's 31 March is asserted here. Verify your own canton.
Where Bitcoin goes on the return
Bitcoin belongs in the Wertschriften- und Guthabenverzeichnis, the securities and assets statement that also carries your bank accounts, shares, and funds. Inside it, Bitcoin sits under übrige Guthaben (other credit balances). You name the asset, for example "Bitcoin (BTC)", enter its CHF value on 31 December, and attach a wallet printout that shows the quantity; that printout is what Zurich asks for as proof (Kanton ZH Steuerbuch ZStB 16.5).
There is no separate crypto form and no distinction on the return between coins on an exchange and coins in self-custody. A hardware-wallet stack and a Kraken balance land in the same section. What differs is only the proof you attach.
You self-declare. The tax office does not receive your balance from anyone yet, so the number you enter is the number you stand behind. Attach a year-end printout from each wallet and exchange showing the 31 December holding. That printout is your evidence if the assessment is ever questioned.
What value to use
The valuation date is 31 December. For Bitcoin the ESTV publishes an official year-end tax value in the ICTax Kursliste, and it has set a Bitcoin year-end value every year since 2015. That published figure, not a spot price you happened to screenshot, is what cantonal authorities expect. Look it up for the specific tax year on ictax.admin.ch. I am not quoting a CHF number here on purpose. Check ICTax for the year you are filing.
When a coin has no ESTV rate, the fallback runs in order:
- No ESTV year-end rate for the coin, use the 31 December closing price on a leading trading platform, the ESTV wording; St. Gallen, for example, says the exchange you actually use.
- No obtainable rate at all, use the original CHF purchase price.
Convert every figure to CHF and keep the source you relied on. This hierarchy follows ESTV crypto guidance and cantonal practice (St. Gallen Steueramt crypto page).
What is taxed and what is not
| Event | Treatment | Basis |
|---|---|---|
| Private investor sells Bitcoin at a profit | Tax-free capital gain | DBG Art. 16 Abs. 3 / StHG Art. 7 Abs. 4 lit. b |
| Holding Bitcoin on 31 December | Annual wealth tax at Verkehrswert | StHG Art. 13/14, cantonal rate |
| Mining, staking, airdrops, salary in Bitcoin | Income tax at receipt-date CHF value | ESTV crypto guidance |
| Private investor sells at a loss | No deduction | private-asset framework |
The exemption covers appreciation, not activity. Selling coins you held is tax-free. Being paid in coins, or producing coins through mining or staking, is income the moment you receive it, valued in CHF at that date. For the AHV and self-employment angle on mined or staked coins, see Bitcoin and Swiss social security.
One caveat that can flip the whole picture: if a cantonal authority reclassifies you as a professional trader (gewerbsmässiger Händler), your gains become taxable income. The ESTV applies a five-criterion test drawn from Kreisschreiben Nr. 36 by analogy, and the safe framing is that you want to meet all five to stay private. The mechanics of that test are covered in zero capital gains tax on Bitcoin in Switzerland.
Filing step by step
- Gather year-end balances. Pull the 31 December holding from each wallet and each exchange. One UTXO set or one exchange balance per line item.
- Get the 31 December CHF value. For Bitcoin, take the ESTV ICTax rate for the tax year. For a coin not on the list, use the exchange 31 December close, then the purchase price as last resort.
- Enter under übrige Guthaben. In the Wertschriften- und Guthabenverzeichnis, add the position, name the coin, enter the CHF value, and attach the printout that shows the quantity.
- Declare any income where it belongs. Salary in Bitcoin appears on your Lohnausweis; mining income goes in the income section; staking and airdrop rewards are Vermögensertrag and, in cantons such as St. Gallen, are entered in section B of the Wertschriftenverzeichnis. All of it at the receipt-date CHF value.
- Attach the year-end printout. The wallet or exchange statement showing the 31 December balance is your proof.
- File via your canton's tool. Submit through your cantonal e-filing software.
Cantonal tools and deadlines
The mechanics above are broadly the same across Switzerland, but each canton runs its own e-filing tool and sets its own deadline. Only one is asserted here as confirmed: Zurich's ZHprivateTax, the browser-based tool that replaced the old downloadable Private Tax from the 2025 tax period (Kanton ZH). Zurich's filing deadline is 31 March, with an extension available if you request it before the deadline.
Other cantons offer their own tools: TaxMe online in Bern, GeTax in Geneva, VaudTax in Vaud, and eTax PF in Ticino. Cantonal deadlines vary and change. Do not assume Bern, Geneva, or Vaud share Zurich's 31 March date. Check your cantonal Steuerverwaltung for the year you are filing.
Records to keep
The core proof is the year-end holdings printout from each wallet and exchange, showing the 31 December balance. Beyond that, keep:
- Exchange CSV exports for the full year.
- Acquisition price and date for each position.
- Your self-custody addresses (or the xpub-derived list), so a holding can be reconstructed.
Private individuals have no statutory retention duty for these records the way a business does. The reason to keep them anyway is the assessment-limitation rationale: an ordinary assessment can be reopened for a number of years, and the absolute limitation period runs long, so records only stop being useful once your assessment for that year is genuinely final. In practice that means holding onto everything for several years. Do not read a fixed "15 years" as a legal obligation on a private filer. It is the outer bound of when an assessment matter can still be live, not a duty imposed on you.
2026 note
The reporting picture is shifting. Switzerland is moving toward crypto automatic exchange of information under the OECD CARF framework, under which Swiss crypto service providers will report balances and transactions of foreign residents, the way foreign banks already report accounts of Swiss residents under the AIA on financial accounts. The State Secretariat for International Finance states that Switzerland will implement the crypto AIA on 1 January 2027 at the earliest, that no obligations exist in 2026, and that the partner-state list is still before Parliament; with data collected from 2027, a first exchange comes in 2028 at the earliest. Verify the current status before assuming your exchange data is or is not being transmitted. A clean return now is the cheap option.
References
- Kanton Zürich Steuerbuch ZStB 16.5. Crypto in the Wertschriften- und Guthabenverzeichnis, übrige Guthaben, proof via year-end printout.
- ESTV ICTax / Kursliste. Year-end tax value for Bitcoin.
- ESTV crypto taxation guidance. Valuation, income events, fallback hierarchy.
- DBG SR 642.11, Art. 16 Abs. 3. Tax-free private capital gains.
- StHG SR 642.14, Art. 7 Abs. 4 lit. b and Art. 13/14. Capital gains exemption and wealth-tax valuation.
- Kanton Zürich ZHprivateTax. Zurich e-filing tool. The 31 March deadline is on the Steuererklärung page.
- SIF, automatic exchange of information on crypto assets. Implementation from 1 January 2027 at the earliest.
This post is educational information about declaring Bitcoin on a Swiss tax return, not tax advice. Swiss tax law and ESTV practice change, cantonal rules and deadlines differ across 26 cantons, and the ICTax year-end value must be checked for each tax year. Verify every figure against the ESTV ICTax Kursliste and every procedural detail against your cantonal Steuerverwaltung. For any concrete return preparation, consult a Swiss-licensed Steuerberater or fiduciaire. The author is not a tax advisor; this page exists because the keyword cluster ranks well, not because the author is qualified to file your return.
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