Overview

Austria requires domestic Crypto Asset Service Providers (CASPs) to withhold capital gains tax — known as Kapitalertragssteuer, or KESt — on income and gains realised by Austrian tax residents. Withholding should occur at the point of each taxable event, placing significant technical demands on platforms: cost basis must be tracked per user, gains must be calculated at the moment of disposal, and a portion of the proceeds must be diverted before the user receives their funds.

Taxbit addresses the calculation side of this problem by extending its existing real-time inventory and gains engine to support Austria's cost-basis pooling rules and 27.5% KESt rate. This guide explains how to integrate with that capability and describes precisely what Taxbit handles versus what remains the customer's responsibility.

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Note: Taxbit calculates, you execute.
Taxbit provides gain/loss calculations and the calculated KESt withholding amount via a dedicated Withholding API. The act of diverting withheld funds — holding them in custody and remitting them to the Austrian tax authorities — remains the customer's sole responsibility.

Austria taxes crypto gains and income under its capital gains tax regime — Kapitalertragssteuer, or KESt. A flat 27.5% rate applies, and crypto acquired on or after 1 March 2021 falls fully within scope. If your business is established in Austria, or operates an Austrian branch, and you hold, store, or transfer crypto on behalf of Austrian customers, you are required to withhold this tax at the moment a gain is realised.

Certain exemptions apply, but Taxbit does not currently identify or apply exemptions automatically — see Responsibility Matrix.

Key Taxable Events

Transaction Type	KESt Taxable?	Notes
Crypto sold for fiat	Yes	Capital gain/loss; primary withholding trigger.
Crypto used to pay for goods/services (Expense)	Yes	Treated as a disposal at FMV.
Crypto received as payment for goods/services (income)	No	Acquired at FMV cost basis. Taxable to the individual as personal income, but not itself subject to KESt withholding.
Crypto lending interest / DeFi liquidity mining / mining / staking-to-validate ("current income")	Yes	Taxbit's Austria transaction handling does not yet accept these income subtypes — see Important Considerations.
Crypto-to-crypto trades	No (with one exception)	Non-realisation event; cost basis transfers to the received asset — except when the disposed leg is Old Stock, or the received asset is non-qualifying (e.g. an NFT); see Important Considerations.
Internal transfers (same platform, same user)	No	Taxbit's Austria transaction handling does not yet accept this transaction type — see Important Considerations.
Airdrops / bounties / hard forks	No	Zero-cost acquisition; taxable at future disposal.
Delegated (investment) staking rewards	No	Zero-cost acquisition; taxable at future disposal.
Locking / unlocking (e.g., entering or leaving a staking pool)	No	No gain, loss, or withholding on the lock/unlock event itself. Locked inventory is quarantined and unavailable for disposal until unlocked; see Important Considerations.
Off-platform transfers (fictitious sale)	Yes, by default	Taxable unless the requirements for non-recognition are met (see Important Considerations); Taxbit's contract is "post a disposal if it should be taxed, post a withdrawal if non-recognition applies."