Donating company stock to charity

Give shares or give cash

For shares you’ve held for more than a year that have gone up, giving the shares is better than selling them and giving the cash. You skip the capital gains tax, and the charity gets the full value.

	Give the shares	Sell, then give cash
Capital gains tax	None. You don’t sell, so there’s no gain to tax.	You pay tax on the gain when you sell.
Your deduction	The full market value of the shares on the day you give them.	The amount of cash you give.
What the charity gets	The full value of the shares.	What’s left after you’ve paid the tax.
Timing	Transferring shares takes several days, so start early.	You sell, wait a day for the sale to settle, then give.

Capital gains tax

Give the shares: None. You don’t sell, so there’s no gain to tax.
Sell, then give cash: You pay tax on the gain when you sell.

Your deduction

Give the shares: The full market value of the shares on the day you give them.
Sell, then give cash: The amount of cash you give.

What the charity gets

Give the shares: The full value of the shares.
Sell, then give cash: What’s left after you’ve paid the tax.

Timing

Give the shares: Transferring shares takes several days, so start early.
Sell, then give cash: You sell, wait a day for the sale to settle, then give.

This only works for shares you’ve held for more than a year. If you’ve held them for less, your deduction is limited to what you paid. And if the shares are worth less than you paid, you’re generally better off selling them, taking the loss, and giving cash.

Keep in mind that you’re giving away the full value of the shares and only getting part of it back as a deduction, so the tax saving is never a reason to give more than you planned to. Starting in 2026, if you itemize, only the charitable giving above 0.5% of your adjusted gross income is deductible, and there’s a limit on the deduction for high earners.

One practical point if the shares are your employer’s stock. You can only donate shares that have vested, and your company’s trading policy may treat a gift like a sale, which would mean waiting for an open trading window. Your company’s guide, linked at the end of this page, has the rule.

Donor-advised funds

A donor-advised fund lets you donate shares now and decide which charities to support over the next several years. It’s useful in a year when your income is unusually high and you know you’ll be giving for years to come. You get the tax deduction in the year you put the shares in, and not when the money goes to the charities.

Once you’ve put shares into the fund, you can’t take them back. It’s also worth comparing the fund’s fees with giving directly.

Charitable remainder trusts

I’d only consider a charitable remainder trust if you have a very large position and you want a good part of it to end up with charity.

The way it works is that you put shares into the trust, and the trust can sell them without paying capital gains tax right away. It then pays you, or someone you choose, an income for a set number of years or for life, and whatever is left at the end goes to charity. Once it’s set up, you can’t undo it.

The main benefit is that it spreads the tax out. You’ll generally pay tax on the payments as you receive them, and your deduction is based on what’s expected to go to charity, which is less than what you put in.

Before you set one up, I’d ask your attorney and tax preparer to show you the expected payments, the deduction, and the setup and annual costs, and compare that with just selling the shares or giving them away outright.

How this works at your company

The rules above are the same wherever you work. These guides cover what’s specific to each company.

GoogleShould you sell Google stock when it vests?MetaShould you sell Meta stock when it vests?

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Vaibhav spent fifteen years building products at Google, DoorDash and Microsoft before becoming a licensed advisor. He works with people in tech on the whole picture, equity, taxes, investments and cash flow, as one plan rather than four.

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