FinDrishti
GuidesAbout
Start free
Exchange ratesBy the FinDrishti team·July 12, 2026·6 min read

Which Exchange Rate Does Schedule FA Use? SBI TT Buying Rate, Explained

Schedule FA is reported in rupees — but never at “today's rate.” Every figure is converted with the SBI TT buying rate on a specific date, and getting the date wrong is the single most common Schedule FA error.

The rate is the SBI TT buying rate

Convert each foreign-currency figure using the State Bank of India Telegraphic Transfer (TT) buying rate for that currency. It is specifically not the RBI reference rate, not the interbank or spot rate, and not the rate printed on your broker statement. Using the wrong source is a common and avoidable mistake. (The one accepted exception: for older dates where SBI never published a TT rate, the RBI/FBIL reference rate stands in as the CA-accepted proxy — see how FinDrishti handles it below.)

…on the reference date of each figure

There is no single rate for the year. Each number is converted at the rate in effect on its own reference date:

FigureSBI TT rate date to use
Peak valueThe day the peak was reached
Closing value31 December
Initial (acquisition) valueEach lot’s acquisition / vest date
Dividend or interestThe date it was credited
Sale proceedsThe date of the sale
The shortcut that is wrong
Converting everything at the 31 December rate is the most frequent Schedule FA error. A holding that peaked in March must use March's rate; the year-end rate can over- or under-state it by several percent in a volatile rupee year.

Weekends and holidays: carry forward

SBI doesn't publish a TT rate on non-business days. When your reference date falls on a weekend or holiday, use the last published rate on or before that date — the same carry-forward convention applies to closing prices.

Why it matters — a worked example

A holding was worth $20,000 on 12 March — its high for the year — and had fallen to $10,000 by 31 December. Over the same period the rupee weakened from ₹82 to ₹85 per dollar. Each day's value is converted at that day's rate:

DateForeign valueSBI TT (₹/$)Rupee value (₹)
12 March$20,0008216,40,000 ← peak
31 December (closing)$10,000858,50,000

The peak is ₹16,40,000, on 12 March. The higher ₹85 rate belongs to the 31 December value of $10,000 — not to the peak. Because the holding had fallen by year-end, its closing rupee value (₹8,50,000) is well below the peak even though the rate was higher. That is the trap in the year-end shortcut: pairing the peak's $20,000 with the December rate (20,000 × 85 = ₹17,00,000) invents a rupee value the holding never actually had on any single day. Each figure is converted at its own date's SBI TT rate — the day's value with the day's rate.

Where the rates come from

SBI publishes daily TT card rates, but Schedule FA needs the rate on past dates — each vest date, each dividend date, the peak date, and 31 December. Looking those up one by one, per figure, per holding, is where manual filing becomes error-prone.

How FinDrishti handles it

FinDrishti keeps a historical SBI TT series and applies the correct rate for each reference date automatically — peak date, 31 December, every acquisition date and every dividend date — so no figure is accidentally converted at the wrong rate. See the full Schedule FA guide for how this fits the whole computation, and the peak-value guide for the date that drives the peak conversion.

One honest caveat about the earliest dates: the SBI TT series only reaches back to 2020, because SBI publishes just today's rate and keeps no public archive. For a reference date before then — say a foreign share or RSU acquired years ago and still held — FinDrishti falls back to the RBI/FBIL official reference rate, the same proxy a CA applies when the SBI TT rate is genuinely unavailable. It runs within a few paise of the SBI TT rate, and every figure that uses it is labelled as a proxy in its provenance, so nothing is silently substituted — you always see which rate valued which number.


Let FinDrishti do the arithmetic.

Upload your foreign bank and brokerage statements. FinDrishti reconstructs every lot, peak, and closing value — showing the source and math on every number — and builds your Schedule FA. The first three rows are free.

Not tax or legal advice. This guide is general educational information about how Schedule FA works, not advice on your specific situation. FinDrishti is a data-preparation tool — not a SEBI-registered adviser, a registered tax preparer, or a filing service, and it does not file your return. Foreign-asset disclosure carries consequences under the Black Money (Undisclosed Foreign Income and Assets) Act, 2015; verify your filing with a qualified Chartered Accountant before you file.
Related guides
Schedule FA · 11 min read
How to File Schedule FA Correctly: A First-Principles Guide
RSUs & ESPP · 7 min read
Schedule FA for RSUs and ESPP: A Practical Guide
Peak value · 6 min read
Peak Value in Schedule FA: What It Means and How to Calculate It