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Why are the same coins worth less?
You still hold the same coins. What changed is the daily close used to turn them into dollars. A lower close means the pile is worth less. The calculator loads Coinbase's USD close for the two dates you pick. The worked numbers below are hypothetical, so they stay put while the live close moves.
The short answer
Count the same coins twice. Once at the daily close on the first date. Once at the daily close on the second date. The gap is the price move. Nothing was bought or sold. The pile did not shrink. The dollar price of each coin got smaller, or bigger.
A tenth of a coin, and a price that fell
Here is one pile (hypothetical). You hold 0.10 of a coin. You add the pile up in US dollars. On the first morning the close is $100,000. The pile is $10,000. On a later morning the close is $80,000. The same tenth of a coin is $8,000.
| What you are looking at | Coins | Close | Value | Versus $10,000 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| The pile on the first morning | 0.10 | $100,000 | $10,000 | $0 |
| The same pile after the price fell | 0.10 | $80,000 | $8,000 | −$2,000 |
The bottom row is this account. The −$2,000 is the price, in dollars. You still have every fraction of the coin. Selling it on the second morning raises about $8,000, not $10,000. Holding it does not put the first close back. The price fell. The coins did not.
These two closes are made-up, so this page can keep the same story after the market moves. They are not today's print and they are not a forecast. The coin move calculator throws them out. It asks Coinbase for the daily USD close on the dates you type, and it does that again the next time you open it. The markets it can look up are bitcoin, ether, and solana. That list is the lookup list. It is not a buy list.
How to read a brokerage statement shows the lines the broker keeps. Coins that sit on an exchange are not on that statement. A fund that holds coins can be on it, at the fund's own price, which is a different number from the coin's close.
One exchange, one UTC day
Coinbase publishes a daily candle for its USD market. The calculator reads the close, which is the last price in that candle. The day starts and ends in UTC. Your local midnight can fall on a different candle. A coin you bought at 11pm in New York may already belong to the next UTC day. Read the dates the page prints. Those are the candles it used, not the clock on your wall.
Crypto does not skip Saturday. The feed can still miss a day if the exchange has no candle. The calculator uses the first day it actually received and the last one. A day in the middle does not decide the change. If the service returns one day, or none, it stops and says so. It does not invent the missing close.
The feed returns at most 300 days in one answer. A longer range would quietly drop the start, so the page refuses it. Pick a shorter range and run it again. Two short ranges can cover a longer story. Do not average them into one number and call it the whole year.
This close is one exchange's print. Another exchange can print a different close on the same day. Your own fill can be different again, by the spread and by the minute you traded. The calculator will not show your fill. Add the fill from the confirmation if that is the number that hit the account.
A fund is not the coins
A spot fund holds coins and trades on a stock exchange. The fund is closed on the weekend. The coin is not. Monday's fund price can jump to a coin move that already happened on Saturday. The calculator, pointed at the coin, will show that weekend. The fund line on a brokerage statement will not, until the stock market opens.
The fund also has its own expenses and its own premium or discount to the coins it holds. A tenth of a coin at $80,000 is $8,000 of coin. A fund share is a slice of a pool, plus those extras. Do not subtract the two and call the gap a pure price move. Bitcoin ETFs walk through what the fund holds. This page only prices coins you already hold, at one exchange's daily close.
The account does not freeze the price
A TFSA or an RRSP changes the tax treatment of what is inside. It does not pin the coin's price. A tenth of a coin inside a wrapper that allows it is still a tenth of a coin. If the close fell from $100,000 to $80,000, the dollar total fell by the same $2,000 as on an exchange account. The shelter did not pay that gap back. A loss in the price also does not hand contribution room back. Room follows the contribution rules, not the coin chart.
Many custodians do not allow the coin itself. Some allow a fund that holds coins. The custodian's list wins over a general description. Read it before you park a coin there. The price math is the same wherever the coin is allowed. The wrapper decides tax and permission. The close decides the second total.
Cash is a different pile. The currency move calculator prices dollars you already hold, between two dates, at a reference rate. It does not price a coin. A coin priced in dollars can fall while the dollar itself moves against the Canadian dollar. Those are two gaps. Write them on two lines.
A position size is a different question
The crypto position size calculator asks how many coins fit a loss you chose, at a stop you type in. It does not look up last month's close. Use it when the question is "how many coins." Use the coin move calculator when the question is "what happened to the coins I already held."
The two numbers can be told apart with the same hypothetical pile. A tenth of a coin from $100,000 to $80,000 is a $2,000 change on coins you already have. A stop at $80,000 on a new trade is a plan for a loss you have not taken yet. Mixing them makes a past move look like a size rule, or a size rule look like history.
What to write down
Write four things before you decide the coins "lost money."
- How many coins you still hold, and which market.
- The close on the first date the feed actually returned.
- The close on the last date, and that date too.
- Whether you are looking at the coin, or at a fund that holds the coin.
Multiply. Subtract. The gap is the move. If you need your fill instead of the daily close, replace the close in step 2 and step 3 with the confirmation and do the same multiplication. Do not mix a daily close on the first date with a fill on the second. That gap is two different prices, not one market move.
Then check where the coins live. If they are on an exchange, the exchange balance is the count. The brokerage statement may not mention them. If you hold a fund, the statement shows shares of the fund. Price those shares from the statement, not from the coin's close.
Questions
Did I lose the coins? No. You hold the same coins. The dollar total is smaller because the close fell. Spending the coins does not use a dollar line at all, until someone converts them.
Why doesn't the calculator match my exchange? It uses Coinbase's daily USD close. Your exchange can print another close, and your fill can differ by the spread and the minute. The close is a common starting point. The fill is the number that hits the account.
What if I pick more than 300 days? The page stops. The feed would return only part of a longer range, and the start date would be wrong. Pick a shorter range.
Does a TFSA protect me from this? No. The shelter does not freeze the price. If the wrapper allows the coin, the dollar value still moves with the close. Contribution room does not come back because the close fell. If the wrapper does not allow the coin, the custodian's list is the answer, not this page.
Is $100,000 the real price? No. $100,000 and $80,000 are hypothetical, so the −$2,000 stays checkable. The calculator loads a fresh close when you open it.
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