Reporting options on Self Assessment: the SA108, box by box

From a year of option trades to the SA108 boxes

HMRC's notes to the SA108, the Capital Gains Tax summary pages of the Self Assessment return, mention options once: to say that the working sheet cannot be used for an asset acquired by exercising one. This page follows one taxpayer's 2026/27 from the trade log to the filled-in boxes, then covers the dates that decide which year's return an option belongs on, part closes of several contracts, dollar legs, loss claims, spread bets and CFDs, and the rare case where option dealing is a trade.

Exchange-traded options only. An option granted by an employer, whether EMI, CSOP, Sharesave or unapproved, is first a matter for the employment-income rules. The shares it brings can later produce a capital gain, which GOV.UK's guide to reporting the gain on employee shares covers; the year worked on this page has no such shares, and the tax worked examples say where the employee schemes are explained.

The law behind each computation is on the tax worked examples page; this page takes those results and shows where they go. Box numbers are from HMRC's 2026 form and notes, which cover the 2025/26 return and were the latest published when this page was checked on 28 September 2026. The 2027 edition, for 2026/27 returns, is due in spring 2027 and may renumber boxes (box 18 is already marked "not in use" on the 2026 form). Premiums are model values from the site's pricing model at the inputs stated below, and BP, Tesco, HSBC and the FTSE 100 are model underlyings, not views on them; the conventions are on the methods page.

Checked against the Budget of 28 October 2026, on 29 October 2026. The Budget made no change for 2026/27 to the Capital Gains Tax rates of 18% and 24%, the £3,000 annual exempt amount or the £37,700 basic rate band (basic rate £12,571 to £50,270), and the worked examples on this page use these 2026/27 figures. The Budget’s rates annex gives the same rates, exempt amount and band for 2027/28 (Budget 2026 rates and allowances; GOV.UK: Capital Gains Tax rates; Income Tax rates and bands). The 0.5% stamp duty reserve tax (SDRT) on UK shares delivered under an option is unchanged too; the Budget confirmed that a new Securities Transfer Tax, at the same 0.5%, is to replace SDRT and the other stamp taxes on shares from late 2027, with the start date to be set by commencement order (Budget 2026). Other Budget changes are tracked in the Autumn Budget 2026 tracker.

Used on: tax worked examples · CGT calculator · covered call · cash-secured put · the Wheel · rolling · FTSE 100 options · US options

Does an options year need the Capital Gains pages?

HMRC's notes list the triggers, and three matter for an options account: disposals of chargeable assets worth more than £50,000 in the tax year; chargeable gains of more than the £3,000 annual exempt amount before any losses are taken off; or a capital loss to claim. Any one of them is enough. GOV.UK's capital gains guide sets the proceeds test the same way for anyone already in Self Assessment, for 2023/24 onwards.

What counts towards the £50,000

Disposal proceeds are not "premiums" in general. Only an ending that is a disposal brings proceeds, and some endings fold the premium into a share transaction instead, following the counting rule:

Shares put to a writer are therefore an acquisition, not proceeds; they count only in the year those shares are sold. The proceeds test is passed mostly by shares called away. Each call-away at a 500p strike on a 1,000-share contract brings £5,000.00 plus the call premium, so about ten in one tax year pass £50,000 on their own (£50,000.00 before premiums), and two would do it at a 2,600p strike (£26,000.00 each). Premiums on grants that lapse or are bought back are small beside that: the worked year below has six option disposals and one call-away, and its proceeds come to £10,578.15.

Not yet in Self Assessment

Someone who does not normally file a return has two routes, both set out on GOV.UK. One is to register for Self Assessment by 5 October after the end of the tax year (5 October 2027 for 2026/27; GOV.UK warns of a possible penalty for telling HMRC later) and file the SA108 with the return. The other, for a UK resident, is HMRC's "real time" Capital Gains Tax service, which accepts gains on assets disposed of in 2025/26 and 2026/27. The report is due by 31 December after the tax year and the tax by the following 31 January (31 December 2027 and 31 January 2028 for 2026/27), and the calculations have to be attached. Anyone who uses that service and is also in Self Assessment still enters the gains on the SA108 in the usual boxes, and also shows the overall real-time result in box 21 for option results (box 29 for shares), the tax already paid in box 22 (box 30), and the report reference in box 54. Someone who has never made a gain and is not registered can claim a loss by writing to HMRC instead.

Which boxes: a reading of HMRC's box definitions

The notes do not say where an option result goes. They define "Listed shares and securities" as shares or securities of a company listed on a recognised stock exchange, shares in a UK open-ended investment company and units in an authorised unit trust, and describe "Other property, assets and gains" as the section for gains or losses on disposals of assets not covered elsewhere. An option is a contract, not a share or security of a company. On those definitions a stand-alone option result belongs in Other property, and a premium that the law folds into a share sale travels with that sale into Listed shares. This is a reading of HMRC's box definitions, not an HMRC instruction, and box 54 ("any other information") has room to say how options were treated.

Two details from the notes shape the entries. In Listed shares, all disposals of the same class of share in the same company on the same day count as one disposal in box 23. And the boxes carry totals only: the notes say the computations, valuations and claim forms go with the return, and that boxes are not to be crossed through or filled with "see attached".

The 2026 form also has a Cryptoassets section (boxes 13.1 to 13.8). A listed option on a US spot bitcoin ETF is an option over fund units rather than a cryptoasset, so on the same reading its result sits with other option results in boxes 14 to 19.

One taxpayer's 2026/27, schedule first

The taxpayer is the one in Example 17 on the tax page: an investor with a general investment account holding ICE stock options, FTSE 100 options and US options, whose year includes Examples 1, 4, 6, 8, 13 and 14, plus Example 15's loss. Example 6's BP 500p call is sold early here, on Friday 21 August 2026 with BP assumed at 535p, for the same 45.00p: this taxpayer's Example 4 call is assigned on 16 October with BP at 575p, when the 500p call would have been worth 75p. The schedule has one row per computation, the date that fixes its tax year, and the section it feeds. Rows that fall outside 2026/27 stay in the schedule, because next year's return starts from them.

Row 6 is dated 17 August although the put was bought back on 18 September, because under s148 the buy-back is a cost of the grant. Rows 1 and 4 are dated in March although both puts ran into April, because a written option that lapses leaves the grant as the only computation. Row 8 is the long leg of the HSBC spread whose short leg is row 4: its loss arises on 16 April 2027, belongs on the 2027/28 return, and cannot be carried back against row 4's gain.

The boxes, filled in

What happens next is HMRC's calculation, not a box. Gains before losses are £3,240.05 (box 17 plus box 26); taking off the year's loss of £199.78 leaves £3,040.27. The notes say not to deduct the £3,000 annual exempt amount, because it is given automatically, which leaves £40.27 taxable: £7.25 at 18% or £9.66 at 24%, depending on how much of the basic rate band the taxpayer's income leaves unused. The pages were needed for two reasons, and proceeds were not one of them: proceeds were £10,578.15 (box 15 plus box 24), far below £50,000, but gains before losses of £3,240.05 passed £3,000, and the £199.78 loss becomes allowable only once it is claimed.

The paper form prints ".00" after each amount box, so it takes whole pounds. HMRC's notes give no rounding rule for these pages, so the grid shows the exact totals, which are what the attached computations carry. Box 54 is where the notes put the detail of any claim and the reference of any real-time report; it also has room for a short statement of method. For this year that might read: Option results are in Other property, assets and gains; the premium on shares called away is included in the Listed shares proceeds (TCGA 1992 s144(2)). US dollar amounts are converted at the ECB reference-rate cross for each transaction date (CG78310). Computations attached.

The same seven 2026/27 events can be loaded into the UK options CGT calculator with this year filled in, which applies the rules again and prints the SA108 totals once the taxpayer's income is entered. The schedule itself can be downloaded as a CSV file (one row per computation, with the rule, date, tax year, proceeds, costs, result and section).

For a record kept through the year, a blank options tax ledger for 2026/27 (CSV) has the same columns as the CSV export from the CGT calculator. Its Event column takes the codes E1 to E11 from the calculator's table of eleven outcomes, and its Contract column the calculator's contract code, such as ice-std for a standard ICE stock option or ftse-esx for a FTSE 100 index option.

Which year's return: the dates that decide it

An option result belongs to the tax year of the event that carries its computation, which is often not the expiry date. The cases below use the tax page's Tesco put and FTSE 100 put, both written in March 2027 with April expiries, and show where each ending lands on the forms.

Three things follow for the return. A written option still open on 5 April has no settled answer yet. A share option that lapses or is bought back stays in the grant year, and one that is assigned moves into a share computation dated at the exercise; a FTSE 100 put written by the same person moves to the next year if it ends in the money, where its loss cannot be set against the grant year's gains. A return sent in before the March grants have ended can therefore need correcting later: GOV.UK allows a return to be changed within 12 months of the 31 January deadline (so a 2026/27 return until 31 January 2029), and after that a written claim for overpayment relief can be made up to 4 years after the end of the tax year. And when an option granted in one year is exercised in a later one, HMRC's manual says any tax already charged on the grant is set off or repaid (CG12317), because the grant stops being an occasion of charge.

Derived: HMRC gives no worked example. HMRC's manual has no example of a cash-settled written option that crosses 5 April; the dating follows from s144A(2)(b), which treats the grant and the settlement as one transaction (points without an HMRC example).

Several contracts, part closes and one series

Contracts of the same series (one underlying, one type, one strike and one expiry) are pooled in a section 104 holding, and the same-day and 30-day rules apply to them as to shares (CG55535). A part close therefore uses an average cost, not the cost of the contracts bought first. The example is a different investor, trading BP November 2026 560p calls, with BP's 12 November ex-dividend date inside the options' life.

Model inputs: BP 530p on Monday 17 August 2026 (model level; BP closed at 519.6p that day), then assumed at 545p on 1 September and 560p on 1 October 2026; IV 26%; r 3.75%; a dividend of 6.39p assumed on the 12 November 2026 ex-date (an assumption on the model date: BP was due to set its third-quarter dividend with its results on 30 October 2026); American calls on the binomial tree, expiry Friday 20 November 2026: model values 16.98p (95 days), 20.60p (80 days) and 21.47p (50 days), filled on the 0.25p tick; £1.40 a contract.

On the SA108 that is two disposals in box 14: £430.00 in box 15, £552.00 in box 16 (£368.93 plus £183.07), a gain of £61.07 in box 17 and a loss of £183.07 in box 19. Matching the two contracts sold with the two bought first would have given a gain of £84.40 and a loss of £206.40. The net loss is £122.00 either way, and with both disposals in 2026/27 the tax is the same. The split still matters for the gains-before-losses test, which counts box 17 before box 19 is taken off, and it would matter for tax if the two disposals fell either side of 5 April. Had a contract of the series been bought on 1 October itself, the sale would have been matched with it first, and a purchase of the series in the 30 days after the sale would come before the pool; Example 10 shows a loss moving into the next tax year that way.

Written options are less settled. Each grant is its own disposal on its own date, and CG55535 says options of the same series are pooled without saying whether grants are included; treating only bought options as pooled is an inference. Where several grants of one series are partly bought back, the computation needs to say which grant each buy-back cost was attached to and why, and box 54 has room for that note.

Dollar options on a sterling form

The SA108 takes pounds, and each dollar amount is converted on its own date (CG78310). In row 6 the put's premium of 17 August converts at $1.3559 per £1 to £213.88, and the buy-back and its commission of 18 September at $1.3344 to £412.92. A schedule for a dollar account therefore holds, for every leg, the dollar amount, the date, the rate and where the rate came from, not just a sterling result. Converting the net dollar result of −$262.00 at one rate, which is what a dollar-only profit-and-loss figure invites, is the method CG78310 rules out: it would give −£193.23 instead of −£199.78.

CG78310 asks for a reasonable and consistent method and names no source of rates. HMRC publishes monthly exchange rates for customs and VAT, and the manual does not endorse them, or any other source, for capital gains; this page uses one stated daily source for every leg. A foreign currency bank account has been outside CGT for individuals since 6 April 2012 (CG78321), and HMRC's guidance does not say whether a dollar balance held at a broker counts as one, so the schedule keeps to the option legs themselves. The full two-leg working is in Examples 14 and 15, and hours, W-8BEN and US withholding are on the US options page.

Claiming the losses

A capital loss is allowable only once HMRC is told its amount: TCGA 1992 s16(2A) makes the notice a claim, and the claim has to be made within 4 years of the end of the tax year (TMA 1970 s43; GOV.UK's losses guidance). Entering the loss on the SA108 is the claim. The boxes that carry losses:

• Box 19 (and box 27 for shares): losses of the year, set against the same year's gains in full before the exempt amount, even where the gains were already under £3,000.
• Box 45: losses brought forward and used this year, only far enough to bring the year's gains down to £3,000.
• Box 47: losses left to carry forward.
• Box 48: losses used against an earlier year's gain, which the notes say applies only in limited circumstances, such as a death.

In the worked year the £199.78 in box 19 is used in full against the year's gains and nothing is carried forward. The HSBC long put's £106.40 (row 8) goes in box 19 of the 2027/28 return. A bought option that lapsed and was never entered on a return is not an allowable loss until it is claimed, and after four years it cannot be. Example 16 follows a loss through boxes 45 and 47 over three returns.

Spread bets and CFD options

Spread bets produce no chargeable gains and no allowable losses (CG56105), so a spread-bet option never appears on the SA108; the notes likewise leave betting winnings off the pages. A CFD-style option is within capital gains tax (CG56100) and its result goes in Other property like a listed option, with one difference that moves dates. It is not a traded option, so s148 does not apply to it (s148(4)), and CG56100 puts all its debits and credits into one result when the contract closes. A written CFD option opened in March and closed in April therefore sits on the later year's return, where the listed option bought back in April would have stayed in the grant year. The after-tax comparison is Example 18, and costs, margin and protections are compared on the listed options, spread bets and CFDs page.

Trading or investing: when options would leave the SA108

Everything above treats the options as investments. HMRC's capital gains manual says that individuals in particular are unlikely to carry on a trade of dealing in options (CG55402). TCGA 1992 s143 and ITTOIA 2005 s779 stop non-trading gains from dealing in traded or financial options being taxed as miscellaneous income, so for an individual the realistic alternatives are capital gains or, rarely, trading income; spread bets sit outside both.

The Business Income Manual starts from a presumption that an individual's dealing in shares and financial instruments is not a trade unless something takes it "out of the norm" (BIM56850), and describes three cases (BIM56860). In Salt v Chamberlain about 200 transactions over about four years, including put and call options, were not a trade. In Wannell v Rothwell a former commodity futures trader dealing from home was found, by a narrow margin, to be trading, but not on a commercial basis, so his losses could not be set against his other income. In Manzur, 240 to 300 trades a year through an online broker were the management of a portfolio. No single factor decides it; the badges of trade (BIM20205), such as the number of transactions and how the activity is organised, are weighed together.

If the activity were a trade, the profits would be income, reported on the self-employment pages rather than the SA108 and taxed at income tax rates, and losses would follow the trading-loss rules instead of the capital-loss rules. The CGT calculator flags a year of more than 250 events as one where this question is worth asking. Someone near that line may find a tax adviser's view worth the fee; the site's guide to finding a UK tax adviser covers the professional bodies.

Records that make the schedule possible

The schedule is only as good as the notes kept through the year. What each event needs, and which part of the return uses it:

A broker's annual statement helps, but it is not the computation. It may date a written option's result at the close or the expiry rather than the grant, so March grants can land in the wrong year; it may net a buy-back against the premium as one trade, where the return treats the buy-back as a cost of the grant; it may convert both legs of a dollar trade at one rate; it does not know that a lapsed bought option is a loss only once claimed, or that shares from an exercise carry the premium in their cost; and it may not show SDRT on a UK delivery as a separate cost. It remains the evidence for dates, prices and contract counts.

Before 31 January 2028

The online return and any tax for 2026/27 are due by 31 January 2028. The points the worked year turned on:

• Proceeds against £50,000, gains before losses against £3,000, and any loss to claim.
• One computation per option series and per share holding an option touched, sent with the return.
• Option results in Other property; shares delivered through options in Listed shares; shares received through options only when they are sold.
• Written options still open on 5 April 2027, and how each one ended.
• Losses of the year in box 19 or 27, losses brought forward in box 45, the unused balance in box 47.
• One exchange-rate method, named in the computations, for every dollar leg.
• The year's rates from GOV.UK: 18% within the unused basic rate band and 24% above it, with a £3,000 annual exempt amount for 2026/27. The rest of the return is on the Self Assessment walkthrough. Capital gains outside options, with their own reporting deadlines and reliefs, are covered in the UK Capital Gains Tax guide.