Crypto tax in France (2026): a flat 30%, a €305 floor, and the loss rule everyone gets backwards
France taxes an occasional disposal at a flat 30% and exempts you entirely if your total sale proceeds for the year stay under €305. The part almost every guide gets wrong is the other side: a crypto loss offsets crypto gains of the same year only. It does not carry forward, and it cannot touch anything else.
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| Tax rate | A flat 30% — 12.8% income tax under art. 200 C CGI plus 17.2% prélèvements sociaux. Since disposals made from 1 January 2023 you may instead elect the barème progressif, which is worth doing only at a low marginal rate.1 |
| The €305 floor | Where the sum of the sale prices of all your disposals for the year does not exceed €305, the gains are exempt. It is a threshold on PROCEEDS, not on profit — one €400 sale at a loss puts you over it.2 |
| Crypto for crypto | Not a taxable event, where the exchange is between digital assets and without soulte: art. 150 VH bis II-A gives a sursis d'imposition. Tax waits for the exit into euro, goods or services.1 |
| How the gain is computed | Not per lot, and not FIFO. Each disposal takes a proportional slice of your whole portfolio: prix de cession − [prix total d'acquisition × (prix de cession ÷ valeur globale du portefeuille)], printed on form 2086 as l. 218 − [l. 223 × (l. 217 ÷ l. 212)]. You need the market value of EVERYTHING you hold at the moment of every sale.2 |
| Losses — the rule most guides invert | A loss offsets gains of the same nature and the same year. In the administration's own words: « elle n'est pas imputable sur les plus-values de cession d'autres biens et elle ne se reporte pas sur les années suivantes ». The ten-year carry-forward people quote is the rule for securities, not for actifs numériques.3 |
| Trading like a professional | Where the buying, selling and exchanging is done « dans des conditions analogues à celles qui caractérisent une activité professionnelle », the profits leave this regime for BNC under art. 92-2-1° bis CGI — not BIC, which is what the pre-2023 guides say. The administration calls this an exceptional case.4 |
| Declaring | Annexe 2086, one block per disposal; the total carries to case 3AN (gain) or 3BN (loss) of the 2042 C. For 2025 income the paper deadline is 19 May 2026; online it is 21 May (départements 01–19 and non-residents), 28 May (20–54) and 4 June (55–974, 976).5 |
| Accounts held abroad — the €750 trap | Every digital-asset account opened, held, used or closed abroad must be declared on form 3916-bis under art. 1649 bis C CGI, with the income return. The fine is €750 per undeclared account, rising to €1,500 where the value abroad passes €50,000 at any point in the year. This is owed whether or not you made a gain.6 |
| Who knows | Council Directive (EU) 2023/2226 — transposition due 31 December 2025, obligations apply from 1 January 2026, and the first exchange of information covering 2026 takes place by 30 September 2027. France's décret n° 2025-1276 of 19 December 2025 sets the reporting and due-diligence obligations of crypto-asset service providers under arts. 1649 AC bis to sexies CGI.7 Unverified: the DGFiP's CARF/DAC8 page lists the articles and the decree but does not itself state a first-exchange date, so the date above is the EU instrument's |
Tax authority: Direction générale des Finances publiques (DGFiP) — https://www.impots.gouv.fr
Why your records — not the rules — are the real problem
The portfolio formula is why French records are harder than they look. A single sale needs the total acquisition price of the whole portfolio and its market value at that instant — so one wallet you forgot changes every disposal in the year, not just its own. Keeping the chain is not optional bookkeeping here; it is an input to the arithmetic.
Two French rules cut in opposite directions and both surprise people. Crypto-to-crypto is not taxed, which means a year of trading can end with no charge at all. And a loss dies with the year it was realised in, which means the same year of trading can leave you with a taxable gain and a wasted loss if the exits fall either side of 31 December.
That is the gap ClearBasis closes: we rebuild the complete acquisition history from exchange files and on-chain records, match every transfer between your own wallets so moving coins is never taxed as selling, and attach evidence to every number.
For the accounts obligation, €750 per undeclared account per year, €1,500 where the value abroad exceeds €50,000 (art. 1736 X CGI, as set out in the BOFiP). We did not verify the late-filing surcharge scale for the income return itself and do not quote it.
What you can use today, in France
The free scan shows your true gains against proceeds-only in about three minutes. The Global Basis Report (from $99) is the full evidence-linked ledger — acquisition costs, disposal gains, local-currency values with cited FX — the document you or your accountant declare from.
Run my free scanComing for France
Declaration formatting for France — your report's totals mapped to the local return's fields, reviewed by a local tax professional before we ship it, and this page published in fr · en. Run and save a free scan to join the list: you will be emailed the day it opens, and demand decides how fast.
Start with the free scanQuestions people in France actually ask
Is swapping one coin for another taxed in France?
No, where the exchange is between digital assets and without soulte. Art. 150 VH bis II-A puts it in sursis d'imposition. The charge arrives when you leave for euro, goods or services — and the whole chain of swaps that got you there is still needed to compute it.
If I lost money overall, do I still have to file?
If your total sale proceeds for the year exceeded €305, yes — the €305 test is on proceeds, not profit. And the loss goes in case 3BN, where it offsets same-year crypto gains only.
Can I carry a crypto loss into next year?
No. The administration states it plainly: it is not deductible against gains on other assets and it does not carry to later years. The ten-year carry-forward belongs to securities.
Do I have to declare my Binance or Kraken account?
If the account is held abroad, yes — form 3916-bis, with your income return, whether or not you sold anything. The fine for missing one is €750, and it is per account and per year.
What if I cannot value my whole portfolio at the date of an old sale?
Then you cannot compute that disposal the way form 2086 asks, because the formula divides by the portfolio's value at that moment. Reconstructing balances per wallet per date is exactly what this software is for.
The primary sources listed below are monitored for change. Confirmed factual updates publish with a new version stamp; substantive rule changes are verified by a professional before this page changes. Where a claim carries an unverified badge above, it means the authority's own site refused us access to the document that would settle it — we would rather show you the gap than paper over it.
1. Legifrance — CGI art. 200 C (taux forfaitaire de 12,8 %) · 2. BOFiP — BOI-RPPM-PVBMC-30-30, cession d'actifs numériques à titre occasionnel · 3. Formulaire 2086 — plus ou moins-values de cessions d'actifs numériques (2026) · 4. impots.gouv.fr — comment déclarer les plus ou moins-values sur cessions d'actifs numériques · 5. BOFiP — opérations effectuées dans des conditions analogues à un professionnel (BNC) · 6. impots.gouv.fr — les modalités de la déclaration de revenus en 2026 · 7. impots.gouv.fr — déclaration des comptes d'actifs numériques détenus à l'étranger (3916-bis) · 8. Council Directive (EU) 2023/2226 (DAC8). Retrieved 28 August 2026. This guide is information, not tax advice; rules change — the page is versioned (fr-2026.1), re-reviewed annually, and the English master is canonical. For binding answers, consult the authority named above or a licensed local tax advisor. Every country we cover → · How France compares with thirteen others →