This act of booking unrealised losses, effectively reducing the realised gains and, hence, reducing the tax payable, is called tax loss harvesting. At present, short-term capital gains tax is levied at 15 per cent on stocks sold before 1 year of investments.
In a series of tweets, Kamath said successful investing is about doing boring things well. “Booking a loss can be painful because we are all loss averse, & we instinctively try to avoid losses. But reducing taxes can add up in the long run & lead to better portfolio returns,” he said.
Kamath asked investors to check if they have realised short-term capital gains on which they are required to pay 15 per cent tax.
If there are, he advised investors to check whether they have any holdings with unrealised short-term loss.
“If yes, sell the holdings (