Reconciliation

Reconciliation is the practice of confirming that Ledger's books match the real balances sitting on your exchanges and on-chain. In a finance team this would happen once a month against a bank statement; in a crypto portfolio it's the same idea, except the source of truth is a public blockchain or an exchange-side API rather than a paper statement. The point is the same in both cases: catching missing transactions early, before they compound into a tax-time mystery.

Ledger reconciles by comparing your declared balance against its computed balance for each asset, asset by asset. Whenever the two disagree, the platform surfaces the difference and offers a small handful of named ways to close the gap, each producing an audit-trail entry rather than silently editing your records.

What causes discrepancies?#

Most discrepancies trace back to a small set of common causes. None of them are unusual; they're just the kinds of things that get missed on the first import and stay missed unless you reconcile.

• Transactions that occurred before your earliest import date

• Exchange transfers not captured by the CSV export format

• Airdrops, forks, or staking rewards not included in trade history

• Manual adjustments that were entered incorrectly

Running a reconciliation#

The flow is short. Open the reconciliation page from the portfolio menu, type in the real balance for each asset (Ledger pre-populates the assets it knows about), and click Calculate diff. The page then shows a per-asset comparison: where they agree, you're done; where they disagree, you choose how to close the gap.

1. Go to Portfolio → Reconcile

2. Enter the actual balance for each asset from your exchange or wallet

3. Click Calculate diff — Ledger shows the difference per asset

4. For each discrepancy, choose an action

Resolving discrepancies#

There are three named resolution flows, chosen depending on what the discrepancy actually represents. Each produces a documented entry in the audit trail rather than a silent edit.

Add an opening balance#

When the discrepancy is the result of holdings that pre-date your earliest imported transaction (you held an asset before you ever connected the wallet to Ledger), the right fix is an opening-balance entry. This is an equity transaction dated before the rest of the history; it sets your starting position without inventing a fake purchase.

Add a missing transaction#

When the discrepancy traces to a real event Ledger missed — an airdrop, a forgotten OTC trade, a staking reward that didn't appear in the exchange's CSV — add it manually via the transaction-entry form. The realised gains and the cost basis update accordingly, just as if the transaction had imported automatically.

Create an adjustment#

When the discrepancy is small and structural — a rounding difference between the exchange's accounting and Ledger's, a fee credited slightly differently than expected — a reconciliation adjustment closes the gap without affecting the P&L line. Adjustments are tagged distinctly so they're separable from real transactions on every report.

Audit trail#

Every reconciliation adjustment is tagged and stored permanently — Ledger never overwrites historical balances, only inserts new entries that explain the difference. The full adjustment history is available under Reports → Adjustments and exports cleanly to whatever spreadsheet your accountant prefers.