Subject: Re: Avoid CGT on your appreciated securities
Is the idea that I give the ETF highly appreciate stock, and receive in return shares in an ETF whose basis is reset, tax free, to the current value of the stock?

Your cost basis doesn't get reset; you just get equivalent number of shares of the ETF in return for contributing your appreciated shares. You just get the diversification benefit. BTW this idea is nothing new; it was very popular back in the dot com bubble days when big bracket wealth management companies like Merrill Lynch, Smith Barney & Morgan Stanley were pitching this idea to their wealthy clients in return for fat fees. Except there were no ETFs back then; the wire houses manage the private partnerships formed.