What is a transaction category?
Transaction categories are labels or classifications assigned to each operation (such as trading, staking, earning, etc.).
Their main purpose is twofold:
Improve accuracy: They help calculate capital gains more precisely and generate clearer, more readable financial reports.
Simplify management: They make it easier to quickly search and locate specific data within your account, improving overall usability.
In practice, categorizing transactions means organizing them into logical groups for better tax analysis and easier consultation.
Trading category and similar
Trading is the most commonly used category. Most transactions carried out by crypto users involve buying and selling cryptocurrencies, as this category covers the main use cases from a tax perspective.
How transactions categorized as Trading are accounted
When you assign the Trading category to a transaction in CryptoBooks:
Incoming transaction: Treated as a buy (acquisition). The asset enters your portfolio at the market price at the time of the transaction.
Outgoing transaction: Treated as a sale (disposal). The asset leaves your portfolio.
Trade transaction: Treated as the sale (disposal) of one asset and the purchase (acquisition) of another.
For outgoing and trade transactions, capital gains may or may not be calculated depending on your country’s tax regulations.
Using the Trading category is generally recommended unless the transaction is related to staking, airdrops, mining, transfers, farming, or other income.
Categories that work like trading (use for better classification)
ℹ️ Many categories work just like Trading
Most transaction categories function similarly to the Trading category from a fiscal perspective. However, using specific categories can help you better organize your accounting and clarify the purpose of each transaction.
These categories operate like Trading but allow for more precise classification of your transactions:
Lending: Transactions from lending activities.
Pool: Transactions from participating in a pool.
Borrowing: Transactions from borrowing activities.
Fees: Transactions for paying commissions.
Payments: Transactions for payments made in cryptocurrencies.
Settlement: Small transactions for rounding and balance adjustments.
Bank and Cards: Transactions to or from fiat sources (bank accounts or credit cards).
Minting: Transactions from minting activities.
Lost: Transactions involving lost or inaccessible tokens.
Delisted: Transactions involving tokens that are no longer listed on the market.
Theft: Category to be used in case of stolen crypto.
Other important categories
Here you can find the list and description of transaction categories that work differently from Trading, as well as those that may include a transaction in a specific report or are used in special cases.
Swap
Swap is a special category in CryptoBooks that allows you to manually connect one Incoming transaction to one Outgoing transaction when different assets have been exchanged with each other.
This is useful when the software does not automatically recognize a Trade: by linking the outgoing asset with the incoming asset received, you can represent them together as a single trade.
To connect two transactions as a Swap, the following conditions must be met:
One transaction must be Incoming, and the other must be Outgoing.
The assets involved in the two transactions must be different.
If you want to learn more about swaps, here.
Transfer
Transfer is a special category in CryptoBooks that allows you to connect two transactions and represent the movement of an asset from one wallet (or exchange) to another.
By marking them ad a Transfer and linking them together, you avoid treating the movement as a sale or income — it is simply recognized as the same asset changing location.
To connect two transactions as a Transfer, the following conditions must be met:
One transaction must be Outgoing, and the other must be Incoming.
The asset involved must be the same in both transactions.
The 2 transaction must occur on 2 different connection.
If you wan to learn more about swaps, click here.
Staking
Staking is a category used to mark transactions related to staking and other DeFi activities. Transactions categorized as staking behaves differently based on which type they are:
Staking Incoming transactions are considered rewards and will be included in your tax report as such
Staking Outgoing transactions are considered deposits into a protocol or smart contract and will not trigger capital gains
If you want to know more about how to manage Staking transactions on CryptoBooks please read this article.
Earning
Earning is a category used to mark transactions related to earning activities on centralized exchanges. Incoming earning transactions are considered rewards and will be included in your income report as such.
Other income
Other income is a category used to mark transactions related to income that are not included in other categories. Incoming Other income transactions are included in your income report.
Salary
Salary is a category used to mark transactions related to compensation received as a salary, paid in cryptocurrencies. Incoming Salary transactions are included in your income report.
Farming
Farming is a category used to mark transactions resulting from farming activities, such as yield farming. Incoming Farming transactions are included in your income report.
Gift and donations categories
Depending on your fiscal country, you will find one or more categories related to donations, gifts, and inheritance.
In countries where these transactions are taxed, you will have two distinct categories: one labeled "Non-Taxable" and another for taxable instances. You should use these categories according to the specific fiscal rules of your country.
Airdrop
Depending on your fiscal country, you will find one or more categories related to airdrops.
In countries where these transactions are always taxed, you will have the category Airdrop. In some countries where they are taxed based on whether you performed an action to receive them, you will find two categories: one labeled Non-Taxable and another for taxable instances. You should use these categories according to the specific fiscal rules of your country.
Fraud
Transactions involving tokens that have been flagged as fraudulent will be automatically assigned to the Fraud category and will be ignored in your accounting.
To learn more about fraudulent tokens, click here.
Spam
Transactions involving tokens that have been flagged as spam will be automatically assigned to the Spam category. These transactions can be filtered out from your reports, but will still be included in your accounting if any actual income has been realized.
To learn more about spam tokens, click here.
Rideterminazione 2023, 2024
This category is available only for Italian users. Transaction with this category are related to the application of fiscal Rivalutazione to asset held at the 01 January 2023 and 01 January 2025.
To go deep on this topic please click here.