I am married and hold some equities in my own name with significant unrealised capital gains in the portfolio. I am significantly older than my spouse and likely to predecease my spouse.If I leave this portfolio to my spouse in my will, what is the CGT position if the portfolio is sold by my spouse.JDProblems with profits, even paper ones, are always a nicer option to be discussing than managing debts, especially ones that threaten to overwhelm.You are in the fortunate position where shares that you have acquired in your name have been doing fairly well, leaving you well in profit on the ledger.If you sell, the position is very clear. You will be subject to capital gains tax on the difference between the purchase price and the sale price – with allowance made for any costs directly involved in the purchase and sale, such as broker fees.If you have paper losses on other assets, you can sell these to offset the profits on these shares. Otherwise, the first €1,270 of any gains that are crystallised in a given tax year are discounted, with the balance of any gains taxed at 33 per cent.But what happens if you just hold on to them and leave them to your wife in your will?Things are even easier in this situation. A person’s capital gains liability dies with them, so any paper gains you might have made on these shares are at the point where you die simply written down to zero.Your estate will not be taxed on the gains you made and neither will any beneficiary – whether you left them to your wife or to anyone else.So where does that leave your wife, who will now own the shares?She is spared the complications of figuring out which shares in any company were bought when so that those bought first are sold first. Instead, she will simply be deemed to have taken ownership at the valuation date – generally the date probate is granted.And as there is no capital acquisitions tax (inheritance tax) on assets passing between spouses, she does not have to worry about tax on the total value of your shareholding on your death either. Her liability to capital gains tax will extend only to any gains these shares make from the point at which she gains control of them onwards to when she sells them or, in turn, passed them on to family or whomever in her own will.What she will need to do is get the shares transferred into her own name once you die as that makes paperwork easier down the line if and when she chooses to sell them, or passes them on to someone else.Any cost incurred in that, as with other broker fees, can be set against any future gain the portfolio hopefully continues to make when it is under her control.Of course, if she needs or wants to, she can sell the shares on the drip so that she can maximise her annual capital gains tax exemption of €1,270 each year if it suits her for budgetary or other reasons to do so.And what if they lose value once they are transferred to her?Then she has a loss that she can set against any gains she makes on the sale of other assets – a painting maybe or other property. But even if that loss means the shares are still worth more than your initially paid for them, it is irrelevant for her. She only has to worry about what happens in the price of the shares from the point that they become hers under your will.Please send your queries to Dominic Coyle, Q&A, The Irish Times, 24-28 Tara Street Dublin 2, or by email to dominic.coyle@irishtimes.com with a contact phone number. This column is a reader service and is not intended to replace professional advice