Overview
Tax-loss harvesting is a strategy that uses the capital losses from one investment to offset taxes owed on capital gains (profit) from another investment. It is permitted under the Indian Income-tax Act. It is used to reduce tax liability on investments.
When To Apply this Strategy
When you have SOLD a capital asset in loss and holding other capital assets which are in profit.
When This Strategy Not Applicable
When you have NOT SOLD a capital asset in loss
You are NOT holding any capital assets which are in profit to adjust the loss.
An Introduction
Whenever you invest in equity funds, you make capital gains. These capital gains are taxable based on how long you stayed invested in that fund.
In tax-loss harvesting, you sell your stocks/fund units at a loss to reduce your tax liability on capital gains. It is a method to offset the capital gains made on equity against the capital loss suffered to pay a lesser amount of tax.
Beginning from 1 April 2018, long-term capital gains(LTCG) of more than Rs 1 lakh will be taxed at the rate of 10% without the benefit of indexation. Compared to that, short-term capital gains (STCG) are taxed at a rate of 15%. In this case, you can deploy tax-loss harvesting to reduce the tax liability on both LTCG and STCG. Usually, investors use it for STCG because the tax rates on short-term capital gains are higher than those of long-term capital gains.
How does Tax Loss Harvesting work?
Most of the investors prefer using this strategy at the end of the financial year i.e., 31st March.
Tax-loss harvesting starts with the sale of the stock or an equity fund which is in loss. Once the loss is realized, you can offset it against capital gains that your portfolio has earned over the period.
For Example
Suppose in a given financial year your investments made an STCG of Rs 200,000 and LTCG of Rs 210,000 respectively. The short-term capital losses were Rs 100,000.
Tax payable (Without tax loss harvesting) = [(Rs 200,000 * 15%)+{(210,000-100,000)*10%}] = Rs 41,000
Tax payable (With tax loss harvesting) = [{(Rs 200,000-100,000) * 15%)}+{(210,000-100,000)*10%}] = Rs 26,000.
Tax savings Rs. 15,000 (41,000 – 26,000)
The amount realized from the sale of the loss-making stock/equity fund can be used to buy another stock/equity fund. This kind of replacement is necessary to maintain the original asset allocation of the portfolio.
Moreover, it keeps the portfolio’s risk-return profile intact. Among other measures, tax-loss harvesting is a vital tool to save a lot on taxes.
Things to keep in mind while Tax Loss Harvesting
Long-term capital losses can be set-off against ONLY long-term capital gains. You CANNOT set-off long-term capital losses against short-term capital gains.
Short-term capital losses can be set-off against EITHER short-term capital gains or long-term capital gains.
Key Takeaways
Tax-loss harvesting involves using the losses from the sale of one investment to offset gains made from the sale of another investment, lowering the federal tax owed that year.
Tax-loss harvesting only defers tax payments, it does not cancel them.
If an investor has no capital gains to offset in the year the capital loss was “harvested,” the loss can be carried over to offset future gains or future income. There is no expiration date.
Tax-loss harvesting is not appropriate for all investors, but it can be used effectively even by average investors with only personal investment portfolios.
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