How to file forex on PIT-38 in Poland — the 2024 tax year

This archived guide concerns the Polish PIT-38 settlement for the 2024 tax year, filed in 2025. Begin with the actual instruments, source documents and recognition dates; then reconcile revenue, eligible costs and earlier losses before checking the return. A domestic information form and a foreign account statement are inputs to that process, rather than guarantees that the settlement is complete.

Which private derivative income belongs on PIT-38?

For a Polish private investor, disposal of CFDs that qualify as derivative financial instruments and realisation of rights under them generally fall within article 30b paragraph 1, taxed at nineteen percent. This guide assumes that classification and that the business-activity exception does not apply. Virtual currencies have a separate settlement under article 30b paragraph 1a; ordinary currency exchange is not automatically treated as a CFD. Other income can also matter when assessing the separate solidarity levy.

Salary and private article 30b capital income have separate settlements and tax bases. For an eligible employee, the salary return can be PIT-37, while the private derivative result goes on PIT-38. The article 30b base has no general tax-free allowance. Its nineteen-percent rate does not exclude the separate four-percent solidarity levy where the statutory combined income base exceeds one million zloty.

Within the capital-income source, results are pooled: a loss on CFDs can be offset against a gain on the sale of shares in the same year, and the other way round. There is one important exception that is easy to forget. Disposal of virtual currencies is settled in a separate part of PIT-38, under separate rules — a crypto gain will not absorb a forex loss, nor the reverse, even though both land on the same return. Nor can a capital loss be set against salary or business income; the sources of income are sealed off from one another.

PIT-8C from a Polish broker — what you receive and how to copy it

A broker or other entity subject to the Polish information obligation can provide PIT-8C. For the 2024 settlement, its ordinary recipient deadline was the end of February 2025; the electronic submission deadline to the tax office was the end of January 2025. Those are different deadlines. Check the actual contracting entity, instruments and statement coverage rather than assuming an obligation from a broker’s brand or supervision alone.

PIT-8C supplies information, while PIT-38 is the annual settlement. Check all data, including income and costs not supplied by a reporting entity. For 2024, a prepared PIT-38 in Twój e-PIT could be accepted automatically at the filing deadline if it was not accepted, rejected or superseded by another filed return under the service rules. That automatic acceptance does not make omitted foreign-account results correct; amend the return where required.

Reconcile the information with every relevant account and any later corrections from the broker. A correction replaces earlier information within its scope; do not add it as another batch of transactions. Missing or inconsistent records require follow-up with the actual reporting entity.

Preserve the meaning of each form field

For PIT-38(17) covering 2024, Part C uses positions 20/21 for the first revenue/cost row and 22/23 for other relevant amounts. Totals are 24/25, current income or loss is 26/27, and earlier-loss deduction is 28. In the 2025 instructions current income, current loss and earlier-loss deduction move to 28, 29 and 30. A correctly established PLN 5,000 loss from PLN 10,000 revenue and PLN 15,000 costs belongs in position 27 for 2024; copying that number into the 2025 position 27 would instead describe costs. Keep the year, form version and economic meaning together.

Foreign broker — self-reporting step by step

Check the documents available for the legal entity holding each foreign account. A broker’s commercial name does not establish whether Polish PIT-8C reporting applies, nor which report its portal offers. Obtain the transaction history, cash adjustments, commissions and financing entries for the complete tax year, and reconcile them to the applicable Polish settlement rules.

Download the complete 2024 account histories and applicable NBP average exchange rates. Identify taxable revenue and legally eligible costs separately, with their respective recognition dates. Article 11a uses the last business day before revenue is obtained for revenue, and the last business day before a cost is incurred for that cost. A single rate attached to every trade’s closing date is therefore not a universal method. Sum the PLN amounts in the relevant PIT-38 section. Assess PIT/ZG from the actual foreign-source income and applicable treaty; the broker’s postal address alone does not determine the source country.

For a hypothetical private CFD settlement, assume that closing the positions realises the taxable rights in 2024 and that the net taxable income after all eligible costs is 50,000 PLN. Leaving those funds at the broker does not postpone that realisation; nineteen percent is 9,500 PLN before any other applicable settlement items. Check the actual contract and any periodic settlement events rather than treating withdrawal as the tax trigger.

Income — what actually feeds the tax base

The article 30b derivative result is the difference between the relevant revenue and legally eligible costs. Reconcile positive and negative settlement entries, acquisition expenses, commissions and any financing items against the contract and report; do not discard negative settlements or count an embedded charge twice. The derivative cost rule refers to article 23 paragraph 1 point 38a, while eligibility must be assessed under the applicable PIT provisions rather than reduced to a universal list of broker fees.

Hypothetical 2024 example: Krzysztof has revenue of 47,200 PLN and eligible costs of 1,800 PLN commissions plus 320 PLN financing charges, each counted once. Costs total 2,120 PLN and income is 45,080 PLN. At nineteen percent the calculation is 8,565.20 PLN, with tax due rounded to 8,565 PLN in the return. He also spends 25 USD monthly on charting; assume for this example that this subscription does not satisfy the cost conditions. Its exclusion follows that assumption, not a universal rule for every subscription or investor.

Deductible costs — what is in and what is out

An expense’s usefulness or a company invoice does not by itself make it a private PIT-38 cost. For derivatives, apply article 30b paragraph 2 point 3 and article 23 paragraph 1 point 38a together with the relevant eligibility provisions. Establish the connection with the taxable income, the timing and any statutory exclusion for the actual expense.

1. Broker commissions and transaction fees — reconcile eligible charges to the reported settlements and include each amount once; verify the expense’s legal eligibility and tax recognition date.
2. Swap or financing entries — identify their settlement dates and whether the annual figures already include them. Count an eligible amount once; a provider can show financing separately while the position remains open.
3. Spread — for a retail CFD whose spread is embedded in the actual entry and exit prices, the settlement already reflects it. Do not add a second deduction for that same price difference.
4. Subscriptions, a VPS, courses, books and equipment — retain the invoices, but assess the actual income connection and statutory cost conditions. An invoice does not automatically establish eligibility or a universal prohibition.
5. Accounting services — identify the service actually supplied and the relevant legal cost conditions before including an expense. Keep it separate from transaction charges and avoid counting it twice.

For unusual expenses, describe the facts and applicable income category to a Polish tax adviser or consider an individual ruling. A large workshop budget does not itself change the legal form or qualify private investment as a business. See the article on deductible costs for forex traders.

Tax loss — two ways to deduct it

For qualifying losses arising from 2019 onward, article 9 paragraph 3 also allows a one-off deduction of up to five million PLN in one of the five following tax years; any remaining amount is subject to the applicable fifty-percent annual limit. There must be sufficient income from the relevant source and the loss must be established in the return for its original year. An omission at the original filing deadline is not necessarily permanent: assess a valid correction of that year’s return and the remaining deduction window.

Hypothetical example: Krzysztof reports a 24,000 PLN qualifying loss for 2024, then has 36,000 PLN income from the relevant source in 2025. Under the fifty-percent route, a 12,000 PLN deduction leaves 24,000 PLN taxable and 4,560 PLN tax at nineteen percent. Under the one-off route, the full 24,000 PLN deduction leaves 12,000 PLN taxable and 2,280 PLN tax. The difference is 2,280 PLN; the first route leaves part of the loss for possible later use within its statutory window.

If you are carrying several losses from different years, you settle each one separately and watch its five-year window — the oldest one expires first. The details and the usual slips are covered in the article on filing a forex loss.

The April 30 deadline — what actually happens that day

The ordinary filing deadline for the 2024 PIT-38 settlement was April 30, 2025. A completed click sequence is not sufficient evidence of successful electronic filing: check the processing result and retain the UPO. For a prepared Twój e-PIT return, check whether automatic acceptance applied. Paper filing has its own statutory delivery and qualifying postal rules; do not assume that any carrier’s postmark preserves the deadline.

What if April 30 falls on a non-working day? Under article 12 paragraph 5 of the Tax Ordinance Act, when the last day of a time limit falls on a Saturday or a statutory day off work, the next working day counts as the last day. That is what happened in 2022, when April 30 fell on a Saturday. In 2025 the date landed on a Wednesday, so no shift applied. The rule works automatically, but check the calendar for the specific year before you rely on it.

If a required return was not filed effectively, assess the outstanding filing, tax and any late-payment interest, and whether czynny żal is available. Article 16 of the Fiscal Penal Code has several conditions, including disclosure of the material circumstances and payment of an underpaid public liability. It can be ineffective where the authority already has clearly documented knowledge or has begun a qualifying official action, subject to the statutory exception. A correction and its possible protection under article 16a are a separate assessment; a summons alone is not a complete test.

Twój e-PIT — the simplest online route

Twój e-PIT prepares eligible returns from information available to the tax administration. Reconcile that proposal with your records, enter omitted legally required amounts, and check the submitted or automatically accepted return. The service cannot make an incomplete broker history complete simply by pre-filling a form.

Use the official e-Urząd Skarbowy login options shown by the service. The login.gov.pl routes include Profil Zaufany, electronic ID, electronic banking and mObywatel; access with tax data is another available method. mObywatel is not described as merely an extra requiring a Trusted Profile activated inside the app.

Select the 2024 PIT-38 return and reconcile its pre-filled data with every relevant account. Add missing PLN revenue and eligible costs using their separate recognition dates. Include PIT/ZG where the actual foreign-source settlement requires it; a foreign broker does not automatically establish either an empty form or the source country. Use the fields for the applicable form version.

Save the filed return, attachments and its UPO for an electronic submission. UPO records receipt and supports evidence of filing, while the records still need to establish the amounts. Under the standard article 70 paragraph 1 rule, the limitation period is five years counted from the end of the year in which the tax-payment deadline expired; statutory suspension or interruption can alter it. The UPO date does not start that period.

Common mistakes that cost unnecessary money

A loss-making year still needs the applicable settlement. If a loss was omitted, assess correction of the original year rather than assuming it is permanently lost. For foreign-currency amounts, use the statutory NBP rate and recognition date separately for revenue and costs; an annual average can produce an incorrect base. The correction scope and any interest depend on the actual error and applicable procedural rules.

A missing PIT-8C does not exempt relevant income from the Polish return. Reconcile the actual broker records instead of assuming that the tax administration already has complete transaction data. The separate article on whether a foreign broker will report your account to the tax authority explains reporting scope; an information exchange is not a substitute for a correct return.

PIT/ZG concerns applicable foreign-source income, rather than merely the location of an account. Identify that source and the relevant treaty before completing it. ORD-U is a separate information obligation with its own statutory scope: holding a foreign brokerage account alone is not a sufficient reason to assume that a private investor must file it.

Correct an identified error through the applicable procedure. Corrections can be suspended in the scope of a tax proceeding or audit. For a correction prepared now, check the requirements applicable when it is submitted: the current text of Article 81 paragraph 2b requires written reasons where the correction shows an overpayment exceeding PLN 10,000. That amount is the overpayment, not merely a reduction in calculated tax. This current procedural point does not change the field meanings of the archived 2024 return. Reconcile tax, interest and any overpayment with actual payments, and retain the corrected return and calculations.

What to do tomorrow

1. Create a folder for the 2024 settlement. Keep each broker’s statements, eligible-cost documents, the applicable NBP rates, the original return, corrections and filing confirmations together. Label the tax year clearly so a later correction uses the correct records and form.
2. Download the relevant NBP average rates. For this archived settlement use 2024 data. Match revenue and cost recognition dates separately to the last preceding business day; test the spreadsheet against individual records before using it for all transactions.
3. Obtain complete account records. Check the contracting entity’s statement facilities and request missing transaction or cash-adjustment details. Reconcile the actual report rather than relying on an assumed report name for a broker’s brand.
4. Retain the return and filing confirmation. Save UPO for an electronic submission alongside the return and attachments. Determine the applicable limitation period from the tax-payment deadline and statutory procedural events; the UPO timestamp is not its starting point.
5. Establish each qualifying loss in its original year’s settlement. If it was omitted, assess a valid correction. Keep the five-year deduction window, source restriction and annual or one-off limits in your loss ledger; correcting an omission does not restart the five-year window.