ETF Tax Basics - Fidelity (2024)

FAQs

How am I taxed on ETFs? ›

Dividends and interest payments from ETFs are taxed similarly to income from the underlying stocks or bonds inside them. For U.S. taxpayers, this income needs to be reported on form 1099-DIV. 2 If you earn a profit by selling an ETF, they are taxed like the underlying stocks or bonds as well.

Q: How does the wash sale rule work? If you sell a security at a loss and buy the same or a substantially identical security within 30 calendar days before or after the sale, you won't be able to take a loss for that security on your current-year tax return.

Free commission offer applies to online purchase of ETFs in a Fidelity retail account. The sale of ETFs is subject to an activity assessment fee (from $0.01 to $0.03 per $1,000 of principal). ETFs are subject to market fluctuation and the risks of their underlying investments.

General rule. Like stock, an investor's basis in ETF shares usually is based on cost—what you paid for the shares, plus any sales commissions.

At least once a year, funds must pass on any net gains they've realized. As a fund shareholder, you could be on the hook for taxes on gains even if you haven't sold any of your shares.

ETFs are built to avoid the capital gains that result from turnover and redemptions. Investors buy or sell ETF shares on a stock exchange from other investors, not the fund. This avoids the need to raise cash to meet redemptions for small investors.

Specifically, a fund is prohibited from: acquiring more than 3% of a registered investment company's shares (the “3% Limit”); investing more than 5% of its assets in a single registered investment company (the “5% Limit”); or. investing more than 10% of its assets in registered investment companies (the “10% Limit”).

Nearly all leveraged ETFs come with a prominent warning in their prospectus: they are not designed for long-term holding. The combination of leverage, market volatility, and an unfavorable sequence of returns can lead to disastrous outcomes.

ETFs can be a great investment for long-term investors and those with shorter-term time horizons. They can be especially valuable to beginning investors. That's because they won't require the time, effort, and experience needed to research individual stocks.

The largest Fidelity ETF is the Fidelity Wise Origin Bitcoin Fund FBTC with $9.93B in assets. In the last trailing year, the best-performing Fidelity ETF was FDIG at 71.37%. The most recent ETF launched in the Fidelity space was the Fidelity Yield Enhanced Equity ETF FYEE on 04/11/24.

Which ETFs are free on Fidelity? ›

How ETFs work. An ETF is bought and sold like a company stock during the day when the stock exchanges are open. Just like a stock, an ETF has a ticker symbol and intraday price data can be easily obtained during the course of the trading day.

The IRS expects taxpayers to keep the original documentation for capital assets, such as real estate and investments. It uses these documents, along with third-party records, bank statements and published market data, to verify the cost basis of assets.

Some of the most common reasons for unknown cost basis are: Shares are transferred to the Fidelity account from another institution. Shares were transferred between two accounts registered to different Social Security Numbers. Shares were transferred between mutual fund accounts and brokerage accounts before August, ...

The bottom line is that the IRS expects you to maintain records that identify the cost basis of your securities. If you don't have adequate records, you might have to rely on the cost basis that your brokerage firm reports—or you may be required to treat the cost basis as zero, which could mean owing more in taxes.

Tax loss rules

Losses in ETFs usually are treated just like losses on stock sales, which generate capital losses. The losses are either short term or long term, depending on how long you owned the shares. If more than one year, the loss is long term.

Here it depends what the gain relates to as residential property (second homes, not primary residences) are subject to a different tax rate. But for investments like ETFs, you would pay 10% as a basic rate tax payer or 20% as a higher rate tax payer.

Sales and purchases—of stocks, bonds, funds, ETFs, or any other securities—that are made within an individual retirement account are not taxable. This rule applies to all investment transactions, regardless of whether the recipient has accrued capital gains, dividend payments, or interest income.

The tax-cost ratio is how Morningstar measures how much a fund's annualized return is reduced by the taxes investors pay on distributions. Morningstar calculates it on products such as mutual funds and Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs).