Some difficulties may be encountered using this tax calculator with screen reader applications. The Tax Office is working toward developing a fully accessible version of this tax calculator. If you encounter difficulties please phone us on 132861 and select 3 and then select 4 for a staff member trained to assist with Demergers

The demergers calculator

version: 1.4.3

Takes 20 to 30 minutes to complete

What does the calculator do?

The demergers calculator will help shareholders work out:

the cost base of their shares in companies that undertake an eligible demerger, and
their capital gain or loss if they later sell their shares.

The head entity should have told you if a demerger is eligible (i.e. eligible under Division 125 of the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997). Some of the eligible demergers are listed under "Shareholder information" on the Demergers home page.

Who should use this calculator?

Use this calculator only if:

you own shares in a company that undertook an eligible demerger
you have only one class of shares in the head entity and the demerged entity (for example, all ordinary shares or all partly paid shares)
your shares are not held in an employee share scheme
any gain or loss you made on the shares is a capital gain or loss - this means that you held your shares as an investment asset rather than:

as trading stock
as part of carrying on a business, or
to make a short-term or one-off commercial gain, and

you are an Australian resident for tax purposes.

If you don't meet all of these criteria, the calculator will not work correctly for you. You will have to do a manual calculation.

Important definitions

Shareholder

Although we refer only to shareholders in this calculator, unit-holders in eligible fixed trust demergers can also use this calculator if they meet the criteria above.

Purchase

Although we use the word 'purchase' in this calculator, you can use this calculator if you acquired relevant shares by any means - including by inheritance, as a gift, as a result of marriage breakdown and by exercising rights to acquire shares.