Here's an article I just found explaining all of this, written by a well-known and respected expert in the IRA industry. It agrees with everything I have said above except that it suggests that you can sell an repurchase the shares outside of the retirement account and can then roll over the repurchased shares, which I generally disagree with due to the complications it causes with regard to cost basis of the shares outside the retirement account. But we are in full agreement on the main point, that the distribution and rollover results in no recognizable gain or loss on the property rolled over:
https://www.kitces.com/blog/undo-rmd-unwanted-2020-cares-act-roll-back-deadline-august-31-same-prope...
