Does one need to declare on the same year as company went into liquidation?

snowshine

Held Shares in Bula an Irish oil exploration company. Although it was a penny share, Bula was quoted on the Official List, rather than the Alternative Investment Market

Now this company is non existent and shareholders were given nothing. 
If one wish to use this loss against any gain made from another stock.,
1. Has this got to be made on the same year as it went into liquidation?

2.Has one got to declare the HMRC in the same year as it went into liquidation so that this sum lost become available to off set against any gain?...

underground99

If the company liquidates and your shareholder proceeds on liquidation are zero, you've made a capital loss that year when it liquidates. You would claim it for that tax year.

When you claim it for that tax year, if you have overall net losses for the year you can carry them forward against future gains. But you will need to have told HMRC about your loss and claimed it, before you can use it against a future gain.

Because if you had not ever declared the loss to HMRC (eg for the year 2019/20 when it liquidated) then when you make a gain in a future year (e.g. 2020/21) and say that you want to offset some brought- forward losses incurred in a previous year, HMRC would say 'what losses? We don't have any records of you having any losses to carry forward?'. So you need to make the claim for the year you made the loss.

If you don't normally complete a tax return, you should just write to HMRC to claim any capital losses or you may lose them. Don't worry if you forgot to claim it the year it happened if it wasn't too long ago - you'd generally have four years from the end of the tax year when you want to make the claim to actually make the claim for losses. And once you've made the claim for losses they will be 'banked' so you can carry them forward until you want to use them.