What do I doif my covered call date is in december of 2020 and my acquired date is January of 2021?

[ken-haderer-gmai]

covered call
Acquired 1/19/21
Sold 12/03/20
system will not accept sold date in 2020

[JillS56]

No.  The acquired date has to be before the sold date.  The dates need to be the opening date for "acquired" and the expiration date for "sold" or there will be issues with TurboTax. The important thing is to make sure the transaction is classified as short-term.

IRS says: Enter "Expired" in 8949 column e) cost, but Turbo Tax won't let you do that directly so you have to go through the "Add More Details" screen and select "Expired". Last I tried, this had no effect either.

I add "Expired" in the description.

Publication 550 - Investment Income and Expense

[Mike9241]

on a short sale, the sale date is always before the acquisition date and I have no issues with desktop deluxe entering sale date being in 2020 and the date acquired being in 2021.  you only use expired if the option actually lapse. many times I will close out a short option before that date.  again I point out I have no issue in my version of TT of entering a sales date that's before the purchase date.  as matter of fact, that's what comes in from my broker when I import.

what's more, no error came up on the final review and I was successfully able to e-file. the IRS accepted my return.

This is nothing different than what I have encountered for numerous prior years. maybe online has a BIG BUG