Currency conversion

Your broker reports in dollars, but a German tax return is in euros. So every amount that arrives in a foreign currency — a purchase, a sale, a dividend, interest — has to be converted to euros before it can be taxed. capi.tax does this for every line automatically.

One official rate per day

German tax rules don't let you pick a convenient exchange rate. The rate that counts is the official Deutsche Bundesbank reference rate (the same daily reference rate published by the European Central Bank). For each transaction, capi.tax looks up the rate for the date of the trade and uses that to convert the amount.

A few practical points:

• The rate of the trade date is used, not the day the money settled.
• Rates are published on business days. For a trade on a weekend or holiday, the last published rate before it is used.
• The euro figure, not the dollar figure, is what your gain or loss is calculated from.

This is why two trades of the same size in dollars can produce different euro results: the rate moved between the dates.

Why the rate shows up twice

A foreign-currency trade can touch your taxes in two separate ways.

First, the gain on the investment itself. When you buy and later sell a share, both the purchase and the sale are converted at their own day's rate. The euro gain therefore already includes any move in the exchange rate between buying and selling — you don't account for it separately.

Second, currency held as cash can be its own matter. If you hold dollars in the account and they gain value before you convert or spend them, that can be a taxable currency gain (Währungsgewinn) under the private-sale rules (§ 23 EStG). A key detail: if the currency is held for more than a year, such a gain is tax-free. capi.tax flags these where it can, but cash currency gains depend heavily on your full account history.

capi.tax prepares your data and is not tax advice. Please review the figures and ask a tax advisor (Steuerberater) about your personal situation.