Upload your broker exports

You can, but the numbers might be wrong. The CRA’s own T5008 states that Box 20 “may or may not reflect your adjusted cost base.” For a few buy-and-hold trades, it’s usually fine. But if you’ve traded the same stock multiple times, held foreign currency, or dealt with options or corporate actions, your broker’s reported cost base drifts further from reality with every transaction. You’re either overpaying or creating a liability you don’t know about.

More than most traders realize. Sell a stock at a loss and rebuy within 30 days? Loss denied, added back to your ACB. Sell shares at a loss then buy a call on the same underlying? ITA s. 54 can treat that call as identical property and deny the loss. Most traders don’t know that rule exists until they get reassessed.

Every USD conversion is a taxable FX event. Options assignments change the ACB of the shares you receive. Splits, spinoffs, and mergers reset your cost base. Each adjustment compounds on the next. Miss one early in the year and every calculation after it is wrong.

You could build a spreadsheet. But superficial loss detection means scanning a 61-day window around every sale. FX tracking means maintaining running pool ACBs for every foreign currency. Options linking means knowing the four-way CRA matrix for premiums. Most spreadsheets break down around trade 50. ActiveACB parses your broker export directly. Upload one file, get your complete report in seconds. No manual entry, no missed trades.

AdjustedCostBase.ca is a solid resource with excellent educational content. The difference is how much is done for you. Its Premium plan offers spreadsheet imports with five broker templates and custom templates. Its documented superficial loss workflow warns within one portfolio and asks you to apply the rule. ActiveACB reads seven brokers’ exports directly, offers a column mapper for other trade-history CSV or XLSX files, and calculates supported superficial loss, foreign exchange and ETF adjustments using the accounts and data you supply. See the full comparison.

Superficial loss detection with the full CRA three-limiter formula, including cross-account TFSA/RRSP affiliated denial, call options as identical property, and year-end December-to-January look-forward. FX cash pool ACB tracking with the $200 annual net gain or loss exemption for individuals. Options exercise and assignment linking for calls and puts. Corporate actions: splits, mergers, return of capital, name changes, fractional share cash-in-lieu, and standard cost-base spinoffs (taxable spinoffs are flagged for review). Worthless security elections with reversal detection. T1135 foreign property warnings. The project has over 13,000 automated test cases, including CRA edge cases. These are not approximations.

Yes, and that’s the recommended workflow. ActiveACB calculates your correct ACB and capital gains. You take those numbers and enter them into Wealthsimple Tax (free), TurboTax, or give them to your accountant. Calculate with us, file with your preferred tool.

Interactive Brokers (Flex Query XML), Questrade (Activity Report XLSX), Wealthsimple (Activity Export CSV), CIBC Investor’s Edge (Transaction History CSV), TD Direct Investing (activity CSV), Qtrade Direct Investing (account history XLSX), and National Bank Direct Brokerage (activity history CSV). All seven are parsed directly for trades, dividends and distributions, and the other six also read interest, corporate actions and FX where they apply. The National Bank parser does not yet read interest, withholding, currency conversions, corporate actions or options, as its guide lists. With season access you can upload multiple files from different accounts or brokers in a single session, and ActiveACB's own XLSX export re-imports as well. The engine merges everything and detects cross-account superficial losses automatically. Any other broker's trade-history CSV or XLSX imports through the built-in column mapper. Step-by-step guides and broker-specific T5008 explainers are linked from the export-guide page.

Your file is processed in a temporary directory and deleted the moment your report is generated. A copy of each file you add is kept privately for 7 days to improve broker support, then deleted. IBKR files are never kept, and you can turn this off on your profile page. We keep a layout profile of it, the column names and formats with none of your values, to troubleshoot failed uploads, plus a redacted sample of the first rows only if you choose to share one. Calculation results are stored in your account history and you can delete any calculation at any time.

Yes, with season access. Click “+ Add files” and select all your exports at once, or add them one at a time, from any mix of supported brokers, ActiveACB exports, and column-mapped files. The engine processes all trades together, pools ACB correctly across accounts, and detects superficial losses across brokers, including cases where you sold in one account and rebought in another.

Any year from 2021 onwards, and for a corporation any fiscal year ending in 2015 or later. For the most accurate results, upload your full trading history from account inception. The engine processes all years chronologically to build correct pooled ACB, but only reports dispositions for your selected tax year.