Technical article

Crypto and Digital Assets After Death

A November 2025 guide from a trust company puts it plainly: a court order does not help if the private keys cannot be found.

By Neil Solomon · 3 min read

Imagine a retired man in Florida who holds some bitcoin in two places. One part sits in an account at an exchange. The other sits on a small device in a desk drawer. His daughter knows he has "some crypto" and nothing more. After he dies, she is named executor. What can she open, and what stays shut?

Here is what the sources show. The two places behave very differently.

The exchange account

An exchange is a company with a claims process. One funeral-industry guide, which summarizes the help pages of a large US exchange, says such accounts typically cannot name a beneficiary. The coins then pass under the will, or under the state's rules if there is no will. The person claiming usually needs a death certificate, letters testamentary or small-estate paperwork, and photo identification. That is one guide's summary and not the exchange's own page, so the details may differ from company to company.

The device in the drawer

A November 2025 guide from a trust company puts it plainly: a court order does not help if the private keys cannot be found. The same guide says the model state law on fiduciary access to digital assets gives an executor access to digital information. It does not transfer the asset itself. So the law may let her see that an account exists. It does not produce a key that was never written down anywhere.

What the tax side says

The IRS now lists digital assets on Schedule F of Form 706, the federal estate tax return. The instructions name cryptocurrencies, stablecoins and digital collectibles as property to report.

On the heir's side, the same trust-company guide says inherited crypto generally gets a basis step-up to the value on the date of death. Its example is bitcoin bought for US$5,000 and worth US$100,000 at death, which gives the heir a basis of US$100,000. The guide does not say how the date-of-death value is set. The statute behind the step-up, section 1014, gives an heir's basis as fair market value at death.

In the United Kingdom, HM Revenue and Customs lists cryptoassets among the chargeable assets for capital gains tax. It lists most personal possessions worth GBP 6,000 or more, apart from a car, separately.

The objection

You might say, "My daughter is smart and will work it out." The sources suggest that skill may not be the issue. The missing piece is a string of words or numbers that exists only where its owner put it.

Who this touches

The executor, who is often a child or a spouse, carries this work. So does a co-owner of a household who has never opened the account. The papers that matter are the will, the court letters and a record of where each holding sits.

Doors you could open

You could list each place a holding sits, without writing the keys into any document that many people read. You could tell one trusted person where that list is kept. You could ask your executor what they would need to see on the day.

Who in your family would know where to look? Share what has worked for you. Someone may find it useful.

Figures are estimates for planning, based on public data. Date read: October 2026.