Bitcoin Tax 2026: Holding Period, Losses, Exemption

Bitcoin trades at $82,558, or €73,577, on Friday morning. The all-time high of $126,080 was set on October 6, 2025, which leaves the price 34.5 percent below that mark. Measured in euros, the gap to the record of €107,662 is 31.7 percent, because the dollar has weakened since. Prices are from CoinGecko.

That date is the reason to talk about bitcoin and tax today. October 6, 2025 is now more than twelve months ago. Anyone who bought on that Monday, or in the days that followed, has passed the one-year holding period under Section 23 of the German Income Tax Act. A sale would be tax-free from today. That sounds like an advantage, and with the price down by roughly a third it becomes the opposite: tax-free also means the tax office no longer recognizes the loss.

Bitcoin and Tax: What Section 23 of the Income Tax Act Governs in October 2026

Germany treats crypto assets as other economic goods. They therefore fall under the private disposal transactions of Section 23 of the Income Tax Act, not under the flat-rate withholding tax that applies to equities and funds. That produces the rule almost every investor knows: hold a bitcoin for more than a year and the sale is tax-free. Sell within the year and the gain is taxed at your personal income tax rate.