Plan your Carta ISO exercise
Calculator · free · no signup · pre-IPOCarta is pre-IPO. Plan your AMT impact at any valuation: current 409A, expected IPO price, or post-IPO scenarios.
Beta · invite-only · AlphaLatitude Inc. · Free Tools
Your grant
Seeded from secondary-market data, as of Jun 9, 2026
Tax inputs
Grant timeline
Net final value at year 3 sale — optimized plan
$94,038
After-tax dollars at end of year 3, net of all federal + state taxes through the sale.
This year: exercise 3,334 shares (of 10,000 total).
= gross gain at sale − federal + state LTCG − AMT premium above baseline regular tax (time-valued)
AMT premium for exercising: $0 (on top of $228,434 regular tax across the horizon)
Optimized plan keeps $935 more than lump-sum.
Federal AMT crossover this year: 4,863 shares ($57,238 bargain element). Above that, each additional share this year adds federal AMT.
Estimates only. Not financial advice.
Net final value by year
Running tally: NTV from shares exercised through year y, minus AMT premium paid through year y. The last year matches the plan's headline NTV. Hover a year for plan totals.
Optimized exercise schedule
You pay the higher of Regular tax and Tentative AMT per jurisdiction, then subtract Credit recovered. The result is Net tax. Hover any number for the bracket-by-bracket breakdown.
| 1No AMT | 3,334 | |||
| 2No AMT | 3,333 | |||
| 3No AMT | 3,333 |
Federal AMT credit
Earned
$0
Recovered
$0
Remaining
$0
Plan comparison
Net value at the end of your hold horizon.
Lump-sum
All in Year 1
$93,103
−$935
Even split
Equal shares each year
$94,038
Optimized
Tax-aware schedule
$94,038
Highest
Estimates only. Excludes disqualifying dispositions, NSOs, multi-state moves, and AMT preferences other than ISO bargain elements. Long-term capital gains tax assumes a qualifying disposition (ISO held ≥1 yr from exercise and ≥2 yr from grant); state LTCG follows ordinary brackets except where the state grants preferential treatment (HI, ND, SC, WI, AR, NM) or has a dedicated LTCG-only tax (WA). Assumes you are within the $100K ISO limit (any portion of an annual ISO grant whose FMV at grant exceeds $100K is treated as NSO from the start, §422(d)). State AMT figures are 2025 (next-year values published in late 2026). Not financial advice.
QSBS note. If your shares qualify (typically pre-IPO C-corp grants held 5+ years), a federal rule lets you exclude up to $10M of gain on a future sale from federal tax. That single rule shifts exercise-timing math more than AMT does. (This is §1202 “qualified small-business stock”.) Modeled in beta, not here.
You optimized one grant in isolation. The beta optimizes ISOs alongside your RSUs, NSOs, and stock in one plan.
Request beta access →About Carta
Carta is a privately held Fintech company, incorporated in Delaware and headquartered in San Francisco, CA.
Last reported secondary-market price: $16.77 per share (as of 2026-06-09). Your own 409A may differ.
Cap table software.
Equity grants at Carta typically include incentive stock options (ISOs) and non-qualified stock options (NSOs).
eShares, Inc., doing business as Carta, Inc., is a San Francisco, California-based technology company that specializes in capitalization table management and valuation software. The company digitizes paper stock certificates along with stock options, warrants, and derivatives to allow companies, investors, and employees to manage their equity and track company ownership. The company also operated CartaX, a private stock exchange, which was shuttered in 2024.
Source: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Henry Ward and Manu Kumar founded Carta, originally eShares, in 2012 to digitize paper stock certificates and replace spreadsheet-based cap tables with auditable, legally compliant software. Companies use Carta to issue equity, model dilution, run 409A valuations, and manage employee option exercises. The platform expanded to serve venture funds with LP portfolio management tools. Carta raised $500 million in a Series G led by Silver Lake in August 2021 at a $7.4 billion valuation, its last disclosed primary round, and reached $442 million in annual recurring revenue in 2024.
Sources: en.wikipedia.org · techcrunch.com
Equity comp at Carta
- Carta issues single-trigger RSUs (awards where shares vest and settle immediately on each vesting date, with no separate IPO or acquisition trigger required) to its own employees, providing liquidity through quarterly windows on its own private secondary platform, Carta Liquidity. At each window, Carta withholds shares equal to the employee tax liability and remits taxes directly, so employees receive net shares with no out-of-pocket tax obligation at vest. Current employees may sell up to 20% of vested holdings per window. This structure makes a second liquidity-event trigger unnecessary: liquidity occurs on a schedule rather than only upon an IPO or sale.
- Early exercise is not allowed: you have to wait for shares to vest before you can buy them.
Sources: carta.com · carta.com · henrysward.medium.com
Researched 2026-05-10.
OptionsAhoy is an independent tool and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Carta.
The calculator works at any Carta valuation: enter your strike, the current 409A FMV, an expected IPO price, or anywhere in between. AMT is triggered on the bargain element (FMV minus strike) when you exercise; the calculator models federal AMT, state AMT, and the multi-year credit-recovery path.
Example: at Carta's last reported price of $16.77, exercising 5,000 ISOs with a $5.03 strike creates a $58,700 bargain element. Above the 2026 federal AMT exemption ($88,100 single, $137,000 married joint), the 28% AMT rate adds roughly $16,436 on top of regular tax before any state AMT (CA, CO, CT, MN). The credit recovers in later years when your regular tax exceeds AMT. The calculator above runs your exact figures.
All Carta tools → · Use the generic AMT + ISO Exercise Calculator for any company.
Carta equity questions
- How much alternative minimum tax (AMT) will I owe exercising Carta ISOs?
- Exercising incentive stock options (ISOs) does not create regular income tax, but the bargain element (the fair market value at exercise minus your strike price) counts toward the alternative minimum tax (AMT). The amount depends on the bargain element, your other income, your filing status, and your state. The calculator above models federal and state AMT, the AMT crossover point, and how the credit recovers in later years for your exact Carta figures.
- Does Carta grant ISOs, NSOs, or RSUs?
- Equity compensation at Carta typically takes the form of incentive stock options (ISOs) and non-qualified stock options (NSOs). Incentive stock options can trigger the alternative minimum tax (AMT) when you exercise.
- Does Carta allow early exercise of stock options?
- No. Carta requires options to vest before you can exercise them, so the holding-period clock for long-term capital-gains treatment starts as each tranche vests and you exercise it.
- Are Carta shares eligible for QSBS?
- They might be. Qualified small business stock (QSBS) under Internal Revenue Code Section 1202 can exclude federal tax on much of the gain when shares were acquired at original issuance from a C-corporation while its gross assets were under $50 million, and held at least five years. Whether your Carta shares qualify turns on when you acquired them and the company's asset size at that time.
One piece of the puzzle.
OptionsAhoy plans your Carta equity alongside hedging, vesting, and de-concentration, across bullish, neutral, and bearish market scenarios. Free during beta.