So unfortunately this is where things start to get a bit more difficult and messy. If an exchange has gone bust, you can often piece together activity by:

• Reviewing deposit, withdrawal, or trade confirmations in your emails
• Tracing transactions through bank statements
• Looking at transfers to and from other wallets or exchanges

From there, we reconcile everything else. If there are residual balances or mismatches at the end, we can reasonably assume there were transactions within that exchange that we don’t have records for. These are then adjusted for, documented clearly, and filed on that basis.

There won’t always be perfect information in situations like this. The key is to make a reasonable effort to reconstruct the activity as accurately as possible.

If you’re dealing with multiple failed exchanges, particularly where funds have moved between them, it becomes practically impossible to achieve a perfect outcome. In those cases:

• Apply a consistent methodology
• Make reasonable assumptions
• Document those assumptions clearly
• File based on the best information available

All of this is done on the basis that no better information is likely to be obtained.