Ethereum Classic is the continuation of the original Ethereum chain from before the 2016 split. It uses the same address format, so your address here reads exactly like your Ethereum one.
It is still mined rather than staked, which makes it unusual among large smart contract networks. If you earn ETC, you earn it from mining, and that is income rather than a capital gain.
The shared address format is convenient and occasionally expensive. Sending ETC to an exchange's Ethereum deposit address is a common and often unrecoverable mistake.
What you get out of the box
Pick your import method.
On Ethereum Classic
- Open your wallet and copy your address. It starts with 0x and looks identical to an Ethereum address.
- If you mine, add the address your pool pays out to. That is where the income arrives.
On Kryptos
- Go to Kryptos.io and sign up with your Google account.
- From the menu, click Integrations.
- Click Add Integration and search for Ethereum Classic.
- Click the Ethereum Classic icon, then choose Import using Address.
- Give the wallet a name, paste your address, and click Import Your Transactions.
Good to know
- ETC and ETH share an address format but are separate networks with separate balances. Adding one does not import the other.
- There is no staking on Ethereum Classic. Rewards come from mining, which is treated as income in most countries.
- If you held ETH before July 2016, you received an equal amount of ETC at the split, whether or not you ever claimed it.
Two chains, one address, and a costly mix-up
Ethereum Classic and Ethereum share more than a name. They share an address format, and until July 2016 they shared a history. Every address that existed before the split holds a balance on both chains.
For most people this is a curiosity. For anyone moving coins it is a trap. Your exchange gives you an Ethereum deposit address, you paste it, you send ETC, and it arrives on a network the exchange was not watching. The transaction succeeded, the coins exist, and nobody is looking for them.
Some exchanges will recover funds sent this way, manually and slowly, and some will not. Sending a small test amount first costs a few cents and avoids the entire problem.
The same overlap affects your records. A tool that imports one address and assumes one network will miss half your history. Add the address once for each network and keep them apart. Our Ethereum integration handles the other side.
Mining income, and what Ethereum Classic is for
Ethereum Classic did not follow Ethereum to staking. It is still mined, which makes it one of the few large smart contract networks where you earn coins with hardware rather than with a deposit.
That changes the tax picture. Staking rewards and mining rewards are both income in most countries, but mining brings costs with it: hardware, electricity, pool fees. Whether you can deduct those depends on whether you are treated as running a business or as a hobbyist, and the threshold varies by country. It is worth establishing which side of that line you are on before you file, not after.
It is also worth being clear about what this chain is used for. Ethereum Classic has very little lending, trading or yield activity, and the few applications running on it are small. Almost all real activity is holding, mining and moving coins to exchanges. If you are looking for lending or liquidity positions to import, you probably have not used them here.
For how mining income is treated where you file, see the USA crypto tax guide or the UK crypto tax guide.
Manage your Ethereum Classic portfolio with Kryptos.
Recording mining income
Pool payouts arrive regularly and each one is income at the value on the day it landed. That value also becomes your cost for the eventual sale, which is easy to lose track of across hundreds of small payments.
Sorting out coins from the 2016 split
Anyone holding ETH before the split ended up with ETC too. It is often the oldest and least documented holding in a portfolio.
Keeping ETC and ETH apart
The addresses look identical, so histories get mixed up. Importing each network separately keeps the two sets of transactions from contaminating each other.
Audit-ready, automatically.
Once your wallets and exchanges are connected, generating a tax report takes a single click. Open Reports from the menu, choose your jurisdiction, and download.
Mining is income, then a holding
A payout is income at the value on the day you received it. That same value becomes the cost you measure against when you later sell, so recording it properly matters twice.
The 2016 split has no single answer
Receiving ETC from the chain split is treated differently depending on where you file, and the cost you can claim is contested. It is worth checking your own country's guidance rather than assuming.
There is nothing to stake
Ethereum Classic pays no staking rewards. If you are earning a return on ETC, it comes from a company holding your coins, and the income comes from that arrangement rather than the network.
Coins sent to the wrong network are usually lost
ETC sent to an Ethereum address is gone unless whoever controls it helps you. Whether that counts as a deductible loss depends on your jurisdiction and on being able to evidence it.
Read-only by design.
- Kryptos only ever needs your public wallet address
- A public address is read-only. It can't move or spend anything
- We never ask for your recovery phrase or private key
- Remove a wallet whenever you like, and its data goes with it
If something doesn't sync.
They are separate networks that happen to share an address format. Add the same address again as an Ethereum Classic wallet.
Import the address your pool pays to. Kryptos prices each payout on the day it arrived and carries that forward as your cost.
You have probably sent it to an Ethereum deposit address. Contact the exchange's support with the transaction hash. Recovery is manual and not always possible.
Still stuck? Email support@kryptos.io or open live chat from the app.