RSUs, stock options and ESPP on a Zurich tax return (2025)

Key takeaways

• Employee equity is salary, not an investment gain. It is taxed as employment income at the moment it becomes yours, and your employer should report it.
• RSUs are taxed at vesting, on the market value of the shares that vest, not when you sell.
• Options you cannot freely sell are taxed at exercise, on the market value minus what you paid.
• Blocked shares get a discount: 6% for each year of the restriction, for at most 10 years. Ten years cuts the taxable value by about 44%. For wealth tax in Zurich you have to claim it yourself.
• After that the shares are ordinary wealth, and selling them later is normally a tax-free private capital gain.

Your employer must give you a statement of employee participation (Mitarbeiterbeteiligungs-Bescheinigung), an annex to the salary certificate. That document is the authority for your figures. This guide explains what it means and where the numbers go.

Figures and practice are for Canton Zurich, tax year 2025.

When is employee equity actually taxed?

Almost every mistake here comes from one assumption: that equity is taxed when you sell it. In Switzerland it is usually taxed well before that, and the sale is often not taxed at all.

What you have	Taxed when	Taxed on what
RSUs (restricted stock units)	When they turn into shares, at vesting	The market value of the shares you receive, less anything you paid
Options you cannot freely sell (the normal case)	At exercise, or when you sell the option itself	Market value on exercise minus the strike price you paid
Options that are both freely transferable and listed on an exchange (rare)	At grant	The value of the option at grant, less anything you paid for it
ESPP discounted share purchase	At purchase	The discount you received against market value
Shares you already own	Every 31 December	Wealth tax on their value
Selling any of it later	Normally not taxed	A private capital gain

The pattern: the moment the benefit becomes yours is the moment it is income. What the shares do afterwards is your own investment risk, and Switzerland does not tax private capital gains on it.

Two rows are easy to misread. An RSU grant itself triggers nothing. Until the shares are actually transferred you hold only an expectancy (Anwartschaft), and the conditions attached to the grant do not change that. An option escapes the "taxed at exercise" rule only if it clears both tests: freely transferable and quoted on an exchange. Most employer options fail at least one, so exercise is the normal taxable moment.

The blocked-share discount

Employer shares often come with a restriction period during which you cannot sell. Switzerland recognises that a share you cannot sell is worth less than one you can, and reduces the taxable value accordingly.

The discount is 6% for each year of the restriction, capped at 10 years. It compounds: the reduced value is the market value divided by 1.06 once for each blocked year still to run. Part years count pro rata.

Years blocked	Discount	You are taxed on
1	5.660%	94.340%
2	11.000%	89.000%
3	16.038%	83.962%
5	25.274%	74.726%
10	44.161%	55.839%

That is the official discount table, printed identically in the federal circular and in Zurich's guidance on employee participations.

Two conditions people get wrong. A restriction has to be a real ban on disposing of the shares. A closed window period, the weeks around results when staff may not trade, earns no discount. And the cap really is ten years: a longer restriction still gives 44.161%.

The same discounted value carries into wealth tax while the restriction lasts, and Zurich attaches a condition there: the reduction is not granted automatically. For income tax your employer's statement should already have applied it, so check that it did. For wealth tax, the discounted figure only appears if you enter it in your securities schedule yourself.

A worked example

You are employed in Zurich by the Swiss subsidiary of a US company. 200 RSUs vest on 15 March 2025, at USD 120 a share and USD/CHF 0.88. Taxable employment income is 200 × 120 × 0.88 = CHF 21,120.

1. 115 March 2025, 200 RSUs vestShare price USD 120 at USD/CHF 0.88 — CHF 21,120 of employment income, shown in field 5 of your salary certificate
2. 2Sell-to-cover keeps back 70 sharesYou are taxed on all 200. If you are taxed at source, what your employer withheld is credited against your assessment
3. 331 December 2025The 130 shares you still hold go into your securities schedule at their year-end value
4. 42027, you sell at USD 160Normally a tax-free private capital gain

Receiving 130 shares out of 200 does not mean you were taxed on 130. You were taxed on 200 and paid for it with 70.

What those 70 shares paid for depends on how you are taxed. Taxed at source, employee-participation benefits are part of the salary your employer withholds on, and that withholding is credited against your assessment without interest. Filing an ordinary return, nothing is withheld at vesting: the sell-to-cover pays social-insurance contributions and any foreign tax, and the Swiss tax arrives with your assessment. Either way the declared number is 200.

Where it goes on the Zurich return

Three separate places, and missing any one of them is the common failure.

1. Income. The vesting or exercise value should already sit in your salary certificate (LohnausweisLohnausweisSalary certificateFRcertificat de salaireITcertificato di salarioYour employer's annual statement of what it paid you and what it withheld. One per job, and the starting point of the whole return.Where you see itSent by your employer in January or February.Open in the glossary →), field 5, "participation rights per annex". If it is there, do not enter it again; it is inside the salary figure you already declare.
2. Wealth. Shares still held at 31 December go in the securities schedule (WertschriftenverzeichnisWertschriftenverzeichnisSecurities scheduleFRétat des titresITelenco dei titoliThe list of everything you own in securities and bank accounts, with year-end values and the income each produced. It is also where you reclaim the 35% anticipatory tax.Where you see itA main section of the tax return itself, in ZHprivateTax.Open in the glossary →). Zurich wants employee participations listed in allocation order, and there is no tick-box on the 2025 form, so the description column has to say what they are. Use the discounted value while a restriction runs; the canton will not enter it for you.
3. Dividends. Investment income like any other, with foreign withholding tax possibly reclaimable. See declaring foreign securities.

What is not wealth yet. Unvested RSUs are outside wealth tax, because you have not definitively acquired anything, and so are options taxed at exercise, for as long as you hold them. The exception is the rare freely transferable, exchange-listed option, which is wealth from grant. Listing those positions with no tax value is normal.

Unlisted shares, from a startup or a private employer, have no quote. The tax value (Steuerwert) comes from a valuation method, and the employer's statement should give it. Do not substitute your own guess.

What if your employer did not report it?

This happens, particularly when the equity comes from a foreign parent company and the Swiss payroll never sees it.

The obligation is your employer's. Since 1 January 2013 an employer must certify employee participations to the tax authorities, at grant and when the benefit is realised, and the ordinance fixes what the statement contains: plan name, acquisition date, market or formula value, blocking periods and buy-back obligations, the price you paid, the number of units, and the benefit on the salary certificate. If shares vested and nothing appeared, ask for the statement before you file. The tax office matches your return against what the employer reported.

If you are taxed at source, the equity income is normally included in the withholding, but individual circumstances often make an ordinary filing worthwhile. See Quellensteuer: should you file?.

Common mistakes

• Declaring the shares only when you sell. By then the taxable event was years ago, and selling is normally the one step not taxed.
• Reporting the net shares after sell-to-cover. You are taxed on the full number that vested; the shares withheld went to cover what was due at that moment.
• Entering the vesting income again as investment income. It is already inside the salary figure.
• Ignoring the blocked-share discount. Ten years of restriction cuts the taxable value by about 44%, and for wealth tax in Zurich you have to claim it yourself.
• Forgetting the shares at 31 December. Income and wealth are separate; being taxed at vesting does not remove them from your securities schedule.
• Using the wrong date's price. RSUs use the vesting date, options the exercise date, never grant or year-end.

Common questions

Are RSUs taxed when they vest or when I sell?

At vesting, on the market value of the shares that vest, as employment income. The later sale is normally a tax-free private capital gain, so the moment that matters for tax has usually passed long before you sell.

My employer kept some shares to pay the tax. What do I declare?

The full number that vested. If 200 vested and 130 arrived, you are taxed on 200, because the 70 covered the charges due at that moment. Declaring 130 understates your income.

How are stock options taxed in Switzerland?

Options you cannot freely sell, which is the normal case, are taxed at exercise, or when you sell the option, on market value minus the strike price. Only a freely transferable and exchange-quoted option is taxed at grant, and that is rare.

What is the blocked-share discount worth?

6% compounded for each year of the restriction, capped at 10 years: 5.660% at one year, 25.274% at five, 44.161% at ten. It applies to income tax at the taxable event and to wealth tax while the restriction lasts, but Zurich does not grant the wealth-tax reduction automatically.

Do I declare RSUs that have not vested yet?

List them in your securities schedule, but they carry no tax value. An unvested RSU is an expectancy rather than an asset you have definitively acquired, so it is outside wealth tax until the shares are actually transferred to you.

Do I still declare the shares if they are held at a foreign broker?

Yes. A foreign custodian does not change that you own them, so they belong in your securities schedule at their 31 December value. Getting the data out is covered in foreign brokers and Swiss tax.

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This article is general information, not tax, legal, or financial advice. Employee-participation rules depend on your plan documents, your employer's arrangements and your personal situation, and they change. PaperTax helps you complete your own official cantonal tax return. It does not file on your behalf. For advice on your specific situation, consult a qualified Swiss tax professional or your cantonal tax office.

Sources

Every figure in this guide is checked against these. Each link goes to the issuing document itself, not to a homepage or to somebody else's summary of it.

1. DBG Art. 17b — employee participations: shares taxed on acquisition, the 6% per blocked year discount capped at ten years, blocked and unlisted options taxed at exercise — fedlex.admin.ch
2. DBG Art. 16 para. 3 — capital gains on private assets are tax-free — fedlex.admin.ch
3. ESTV — Kreisschreiben Nr. 37 of 30 October 2020, Besteuerung von Mitarbeiterbeteiligungen. Section 3.3 carries the discount table and the formula (100 : 1.06ⁿ); section 4.1 the listed-and-free option rule; section 5 the taxation of RSUs on conversion into shares — estv.admin.ch
4. Federal ordinance on employee-participation reporting duties (Mitarbeiterbeteiligungsverordnung, MBV, SR 642.115.325.1), in force 1 January 2013. Art. 4 lists what a statement for employee shares must contain — fedlex.admin.ch
5. Canton Zurich, Zürcher Steuerbuch 17a.1 — the cantonal information sheet on employee participations, valid from 6 January 2025: the same discount table, the wealth-tax rule that the reduction "is not granted automatically", expectancies and exercise-taxed options outside wealth tax, and closed window periods not counting as blocking periods — zh.ch
6. SSK / ESTV — Wegleitung zum Ausfüllen des Lohnausweises, valid from 1 January 2025: employee-participation income goes in field 5, with the detail on an annex per the MBV — estv.admin.ch
7. Canton Zurich — guide to the 2025 tax return: employee participations held at the end of liability go in the securities schedule, in order of allocation, valued per Zürcher Steuerbuch 17a.1 — zh.ch
8. Canton Zurich — securities and credit balances schedule, form 340, tax year 2025 — zh.ch

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