IRS mandates 1099-DA reporting for crypto brokers

TLDR

The IRS has created Form 1099-DA and is making crypto brokers report digital asset transactions starting with the 2025 tax year.

1. Form 1099-DA will be the standard tax form for reporting 2025 digital asset transactions by brokers, with forms first arriving for returns due in 2026.
2. For 2025, most 1099-DA copies will show gross proceeds only, so crypto users still need their own records to calculate gains, losses, and income accurately.
3. From the 2026 tax year, rules move toward mandatory basis reporting and broader data sharing, raising enforcement pressure on both U.S. investors and compliant exchanges.

Confidence: high because multiple recent policy-focused reports describe the same 1099-DA framework and timelines.

Deep Dive

1. What Form 1099-DA Actually Does

The IRS has introduced Form 1099-DA as the dedicated information return for digital asset activity, similar in role to 1099-B for stock brokers. It becomes the required form for reporting 2025 digital asset transactions by brokers, with the first wave of forms going out for the 2025 tax year filings due in 2026.[](https://crypto.news/irs-1099-da-crypto-tax-day-2026-guide)

Brokers here covers many centralized exchanges and other regulated intermediaries that execute or facilitate digital asset trades for customers, and the IRS defines digital assets broadly, including cryptocurrencies and stablecoins.[](https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/crypto/articles/irs-asking-crypto-again-most-120216614.html) Some DeFi-style platforms or wallets could be captured if they meet the regulatory broker definition, but that depends on final rules and implementation details.

2. Practical Impact On Crypto Users

For the 2025 tax year, reporting on 1099-DA is focused on gross proceeds from digital asset disposals; cost basis reporting by brokers is generally voluntary.[](https://crypto.news/irs-1099-da-crypto-tax-day-2026-guide) That means many forms will not show your actual gain or loss, so users still need complete transaction histories (buys, transfers, swaps, fees) to compute taxable results.

Separately, every U.S. Form 1040 filer must answer the digital asset question, regardless of whether they receive a 1099-DA, and even small transactions like spending crypto or swapping tokens can be reportable events.[](https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/crypto/articles/irs-asking-crypto-again-most-120216614.html) Studies suggest historic underreporting has been widespread, which is one reason the IRS is tightening data collection.[](https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/crypto/articles/only-6-5-crypto-traders-065522732.html)

3. Next Steps And Emerging Risks

Reports indicate that beginning with the 2026 tax year, basis reporting on 1099-DA will become mandatory, so brokers will eventually have to provide both proceeds and adjusted basis figures, bringing crypto much closer to traditional securities reporting.[](https://crypto.news/irs-1099-da-crypto-tax-day-2026-guide) That shift will likely increase audit risk when broker data and self-reported returns do not match.

In parallel, the U.S. is aligning with the OECDs Crypto-Asset Reporting Framework, which pushes exchanges and other service providers worldwide to share identity and transaction data with tax authorities, with automatic information exchange targeted around 2027.[](https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/crypto/articles/only-6-5-crypto-traders-065522732.html) For platforms, this points to higher compliance costs, stricter KYC, and possible geofencing; for users, it reduces the long term viability of invisible onshore activity.

Conclusion

The 1099-DA mandate is part of a broader strategy to pull crypto into the same information-reporting net that already covers stocks and other financial assets. In the near term, it increases paperwork for compliant exchanges and forces users to reconcile broker forms with their own records; over the next few years, expanding basis reporting and international data sharing will make unreported crypto gains much harder to hide and push more of the ecosystem toward fully regulated venues.