A cryptocurrency tax document checklist asks each client for four things: every tax form each exchange issued, the full transaction history from every exchange since the first purchase, records for any self-custody wallet, and the date and dollar value of each reward received. Together they let the preparer match proceeds to cost basis and report income nobody else reported.
Which exchange forms belong on a cryptocurrency tax document checklist?
The main exchange form on a cryptocurrency tax document checklist is Form 1099-DA, which brokers use to report digital asset sales. It applies to sales from 2025 onward, reports gross proceeds for 2025 sales, and adds cost basis only for certain assets bought after 2025. Rewards are not on it, so the form never tells the whole story.
The IRS digital assets page (last reviewed 2 September 2026) says reporting "is required to be made on Form 1099-DA beginning with transactions on or after Jan. 1, 2025," and that "brokers must report basis on certain transactions effected on or after Jan. 1, 2026." The Instructions for Form 1099-DA (2026) explain which ones. A covered security, the kind that gets basis reporting, is a digital asset acquired after 2025 in an account where the broker provided custodial services and held there until it was sold. Anything acquired before 2026 is noncovered, and so is anything transferred in from elsewhere. For noncovered assets the broker may leave basis blank.
That gives three cases by tax year:
- Tax year 2024 and earlier. No Form 1099-DA exists. The transaction history and the client's own records carry everything.
- Tax year 2025. A 1099-DA reports gross proceeds. Basis comes from the client's history.
- Tax year 2026 and later. A 1099-DA reports proceeds, plus basis for covered assets. Older holdings and transferred-in coins still need the client's basis records.
The same instructions say: "Do not report rewards and staking payments on Form 1099-DA." Staking and similar income therefore has to come from somewhere else, which the rewards section below covers. Ask the client for every tax document each platform posts for the year, not only the 1099-DA, and record on the checklist which ones arrived.
Collecting forms is half the work; entering sales from them is the other half. The post on 1099-B data entry covers entering lots and tying them to a broker's totals, and the same habits apply to a 1099-DA. When a form simply does not show up, the steps in what to do about a missing 1099-B carry over.
Cryptocurrency transaction history exports to request
A cryptocurrency transaction history export is a file, usually a CSV, listing every buy, sale, trade, transfer and reward on an account. Ask for the full history from each exchange since the client's first purchase, not only the tax year, because the cost of a coin sold this year may sit in a purchase made years ago.
The IRS says on its digital assets page that a client with digital asset transactions should keep records that document purchases, receipts, sales, exchanges and other dispositions, along with the dollar fair market value of digital assets received as income. A tax-year-only export shows the sales but not the buys behind them. Without the buys, there is no basis.
Ask for these items for each exchange account:
- The complete transaction history in the exchange's export format, from account opening to 31 December of the tax year.
- The account statement or summary showing the year-end balance by asset.
- A list of deposits and withdrawals of coins, with dates and destination addresses, if the history export does not include them.
- Closed accounts too. An account the client stopped using in an earlier year may still hold the purchase that funded this year's sale.
Name the date range on the request. "Your history from the day you opened the account through December 31, 2026" is clearer than "your crypto records."
An example per-exchange and per-wallet checklist
This is a filled-in example for a fictional client. The platforms, addresses and dates are all examples.
| Account | Form expected | History export | Date range covered | Basis source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Example Exchange A, account ending XXXX-4821 | 1099-DA for 2026 | CSV received | Mar 2019 to Dec 2026 | Exchange export; 1099-DA for covered lots |
| Example Exchange B (closed 2023) | None | CSV requested | Jun 2020 to Aug 2023 | Exchange export |
| Self-custody wallet, address ending ...7f3a | None | Block explorer export received | Aug 2023 to Dec 2026 | Transfers in from Exchange B |
| Staking on Example Exchange A | None (rewards are off 1099-DA) | Rewards report requested | Jan to Dec 2026 | Value at receipt |
Every row shows where basis will come from. A blank basis source is the line to chase first.
Self-custody wallet records for crypto clients
A self-custody wallet is one where the client holds the private keys, rather than an exchange holding the coins for them. No broker reports what happens in it. Ask for the wallet's public addresses, every transfer in and out with dates, and a note of which transfers went to or came from the client's own exchange accounts.
The Instructions for Form 1099-DA (2026) leave out a person who only provides hardware or software that lets users control their own private keys. Activity inside a self-custody wallet, then, reaches the preparer only through the client.
Transfers matter because they can look like sales. The IRS frequently asked questions on virtual currency transactions (last reviewed 30 June 2026) say that moving virtual currency between wallets, addresses or accounts the taxpayer owns is a non-taxable event, even if an exchange issues an information return. Those FAQs generally apply to transactions completed before 1 January 2025, so read them with that limit in mind. A withdrawal from an exchange to the client's own wallet still needs to be labelled as such on the checklist, so nobody reads it as a disposal.
For each wallet, collect:
- The public address or addresses.
- An export of transactions, from the wallet software or from a block explorer.
- A note naming the owner of each address the wallet sent to or received from, where the client knows it.
- Any swaps or trades made from the wallet, since those are dispositions.
Staking, mining and airdrop records on the cryptocurrency checklist
Staking, mining and airdrop rewards on a cryptocurrency checklist are new coins the client received. Each reward needs two facts: the date and time the client could first sell or move it, and its fair market value in dollars at that moment. Because Form 1099-DA does not report rewards, the client's own records carry this income.
Rev. Rul. 2023-14, the IRS ruling on staking rewards, holds that when a cash-method taxpayer receives validation rewards from staking, their fair market value is included in gross income in the year the taxpayer gains dominion and control over them, measured as of the date and time of that control. It says the same applies when staking happens through an exchange. The ruling also notes that a person who mines cryptocurrency includes its fair market value in income for the year of dominion and control.
The IRS virtual currency FAQs say that new cryptocurrency received in an airdrop after a hard fork is ordinary income equal to its fair market value when received, provided the taxpayer has dominion and control. The IRS digital assets page says income from forks, staking or mining is reported on Schedule 1 of Form 1040.
Ask the client for:
- A rewards report from each platform where they staked, listing each reward, its date and units.
- A value source for each reward. The virtual currency FAQs say that for exchange transactions, the value recorded by the exchange is used, and that a value from a cryptocurrency or blockchain explorer is accepted for transactions outside an exchange.
- Mining records, including pool payout reports, if the client mines.
- Airdrop details: what was received, when, and in which wallet.
Coins received as rewards are often sold in a later year, so the rewards report belongs in the permanent file, not just this year's.
Why does cryptocurrency cost basis go missing?
Cryptocurrency cost basis is what the client paid for a coin, including fees. It goes missing when coins move between platforms, when an exchange closes or fails, or when a form reports proceeds with no basis. In each case the receiving platform never saw the purchase, so the client's older records are the only proof.
The IRS virtual currency FAQs describe basis as "the amount you spent to acquire the virtual currency," including fees and commissions, in U.S. dollars. Three edge cases account for most gaps:
- Transfers between exchanges. The Instructions for Form 1099-DA (2026) treat assets transferred in to a custodial broker as noncovered and have the broker report the units and date transferred in, but not what they cost. The cost sits in the sending platform's history.
- Closed or failed exchanges. A platform that shut down may no longer offer exports. Whatever the client downloaded, emailed or screenshotted at the time is what remains. Ask early, since it can take the client a while to find.
- Proceeds with no basis. Any 2025 Form 1099-DA, and any 2026 form for noncovered assets, may show proceeds with the basis boxes blank. That is not an error on the form.
Which units were sold also affects basis. The virtual currency FAQs say a taxpayer may choose which units are sold if they can specifically identify them and substantiate their basis, and that otherwise units are treated as sold first in, first out. The checklist does not decide that question; it just needs to collect the records the preparer will need to answer it.
Wording the digital asset question for cryptocurrency clients
The digital asset question on Form 1040 asks whether, during the tax year, the client received a digital asset as a reward, award or payment, or sold, exchanged or otherwise disposed of one. Clients who hold coins and staked or swapped them sometimes answer no because they never cashed out. Ask in concrete terms instead.
The IRS digital assets page says to answer no if the client only held digital assets, bought them with real currency without selling, or moved them between wallets they control. It says to answer yes if the client received digital assets as payment, as a reward, or from mining, staking or a hard-fork airdrop, or sold, exchanged or otherwise transferred them. It also notes that paying a transaction fee with digital assets counts as a transaction.
A single yes or no on an organizer invites a wrong answer. Break it into plain questions:
- Did you receive any crypto as pay, a reward, staking income or an airdrop this year?
- Did you sell any crypto, trade one coin for another, or spend crypto on anything?
- Did you pay any network fees in crypto?
- Did you only buy and hold, or move coins between your own accounts?
The post on the yes/no questions page of a tax organizer covers how those pages are laid out. For the wider set of income documents beyond digital assets, see which documents to request from tax clients.
Other specialized lists follow the same per-account pattern. The expat tax document checklist does it for foreign accounts, and the household employee tax checklist does it for a family's payroll records.
Schema CPA sets each client's checklist from last year's return and flags a form that came in last year but not this year, so a returning crypto client with a gap in the file stands out early. The document types it reads are listed on the homepage.