Tax Ques: Capital Gain as Sold Mutual Fund

[Sunset]

I have a mutual fund "Janus research" for about 25 years.
For 15 years the dividends and capital gains were reinvested
10 years ago I told them to stop reinvesting and send me the money.
Basically there is a 15 and a 10 year period to complicate the question.

I sold it all this year so average basis is fine, but I'm a unsure of the capital gains, and don't know if they will provide a complete tracking due to the age of the holding.

Are the capital gains:

1. Sold price - (purchase price + 15 yrs reinvested dividends + 15 yrs reinvested declared capital gains)
   
2. Sold price - (purchase price + 15 yrs reinvested dividends + 15 yrs reinvested declared capital gains) + 10 years declared capital gains

 

[jebmke]

I have a mutual fund "Janus research" for about 25 years.
For 15 years the dividends and capital gains were reinvested
10 years ago I told them to stop reinvesting and send me the money.
Basically there is a 15 and a 10 year period to complicate the question.

I sold it all this year so average basis is fine, but I'm a unsure of the capital gains, and don't know if they will provide a complete tracking due to the age of the holding.

Are the capital gains:

1. Sold price - (purchase price + 15 yrs reinvested dividends + 15 yrs reinvested declared capital gains)
   
2. Sold price - (purchase price + 15 yrs reinvested dividends + 15 yrs reinvested declared capital gains) + 10 years declared capital gains

Only distributions that are actually reinvested in the fund, either by them or by you are part of the basis.

 

[disneysteve]

I wish I had the answer as I'm in the exact same situation with our Janus fund holdings. I'm not selling because I don't want to deal with the tax issue. Hopefully we'll never need to touch that money and our daughter will just inherit it at a stepped up basis and it will be simple for her to sell. This is all complicated by the fact that these holdings pre-date when the fund companies were required to track our cost basis so I wouldn't even have that info if I sold today.


I'll be very curious to hear how this works out for you so please keep us posted.

 

[RE2Boys]

Capital gain would be sold price $ -(purchase price $ plus all reinvested distributions $).


You only add in the dollars (not shares) that were reinvested or cost of additional shares purchased.

 

[audreyh1]

Right, only reinvested distributions add to the original cost basis in $.

Fortunately Fidelity keeps track of this stuff for me. They did even before fund companies were required to. I can see each lot and its cost basis in my positions view. Many of my funds were tracked at average cost basis by Fidelity for a many years before I got smart and switched to specific shares as default. Average cost basis can simplify things when selling, but gives you a little less control.

I do have enough info in Quicken that I could probably reconstruct if necessary but I’m glad I don’t have to.

 

[Sunset]

The first 15 years are easy as all re-invested.

I am sure they paid out the dividends in the last 10 years by check/deposit to bank accnt.
I will double check they also paid out the declared capital gains at the same time. That will answer for me, whether the final 10 years affects the cost basis or not.
Obviously if they did pay dividends and paid declared capital gains to me each year in the last 10 years, then it doesn't affect the cost basis as nothing was re-invested.

I hope they send a complete statement, as it would be re-assuring if the numbers match up to my calculations

 

[Trailwalker]

I wish I had the answer as I'm in the exact same situation with our Janus fund holdings. I'm not selling because I don't want to deal with the tax issue. Hopefully we'll never need to touch that money and our daughter will just inherit it at a stepped up basis and it will be simple for her to sell. This is all complicated by the fact that these holdings pre-date when the fund companies were required to track our cost basis so I wouldn't even have that info if I sold today.


I'll be very curious to hear how this works out for you so please keep us posted.

Same situation with two mutual funds (predating when funds were required to track cost basis). I'm chipping away at them by moving chunks to a Donor Advised Fund.

 

[Sunset]

I wish I had the answer as I'm in the exact same situation with our Janus fund holdings. I'm not selling because I don't want to deal with the tax issue. Hopefully we'll never need to touch that money and our daughter will just inherit it at a stepped up basis and it will be simple for her to sell. This is all complicated by the fact that these holdings pre-date when the fund companies were required to track our cost basis so I wouldn't even have that info if I sold today.


I'll be very curious to hear how this works out for you so please keep us posted.

There may be some good news here.

We checked on the Janus site, and they had a list of the realized capital gains for the fund and the number was close to our calculated number, off by just $2K.
Importantly, they had a number for the non-covered time and a number for the covered time.

We will see when we get the tax form, if it matches to what the website reported.