You are clearly talking about the spin off of Brighthouse from MetLife.
I assume you got your original MetLife stock in the demutualization of MetLife back in the year 2000.
If that assumption is correct then you basis in MetLife is $0, per the IRS. (Though, there's an ongoing dispute about that.)
When a company is spun out of another company in a tax free spin off then you allocate your basis in the original stock between your original holdings and your new holdings in proportion to their values immediately after the spin off. The recommended percentage allocation in this case is 10.3635%, so 10.3635% x $0 = $0 and that's your basis in all the Brighthouse stock you received, which I assume is the fractional share of .909091. Further, when a company is spun out of another company in a tax free spin off then the holding period from the "old" stock carries over to the "new" stock, so your holding period also dates back to the year 2000.
So now you have all the information you need to enter the sale, the same information that shows up for every single sale of a security on Form 8949.
- Description of what was sold: Brighthouse Financial stock. (You don't need to indicate how many shares but if you want to, add that in.)
- Date of sale: 8/7/2017
- Proceeds of sale: $53.37
- Cost basis: $0
- Date acquired: 4/7/2000
Delete that stock sale and simply enter that information in TurboTax's default "fill in the blanks" security sale entry form. Since basis isn't being reported this would be a Box E trade. If you really had taxes withheld on this sale - your "Box 4" reference means that - then click the blue "I'll enter additional info..." button and that box will become available to you.
Tom Young
