You may have already resolved your question; however, if this issue remains unresolved, here is a suggestion. Because you did not close your short position at the end of 2022, your cost remains unknown. Thus, for your cost basis, enter the year-end closing price of 1770.9. Use your opening price of 1899.1 as the fair market value on the last day of the year. While this approach may seem counter-intuitive, it will produce the correct unrecognized gain in column (e).
In TurboTax you can enter a description such as One Short Russell 2000 Futures or similar description to give adequate notice to any reviewer that your position is a short position, and thus, the opening trade was a sell to open, and at the end of the year, the buy to close had not yet occurred; however, the short position, as you noted in your post, had an unrecognized gain.
In TurboTax, enter your information about this trade as follows:
- In TurboTax CD/download, select Personal Income, then scroll down to Investment Income and select Contracts and Straddles. In TurboTax online the process is similar, except you will begin the process by selecting Investments and Savings.
- You may see a screen requesting information about Elections, skip that page as it does not seem to apply to your tax situation.
- On the screen, Contracts and Straddles, select Unrecognized gains from positions held on December 31, 2022.
- On the screen, Part III - Unrecognized Gains, enter your information. Whatever description you enter in the description field will appear on Form 6781.
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