CEO and co-founder of Goldman Sachs-backed crypto finance company Circle has said the biggest regulatory hurdle facing crypto today is the lack of clarity from the United States securities regulator over how to define various crypto assets. Jeremy Allaire made his remarks in an AMA reddit thread he initiated on Jan. 10 together with Circle co-founder Sean Neville and other representatives from the firm. In response to a question over Circle’s efforts to educate regulators like the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) about the crypto industry, as well as specific challenges the company faces, Allaire wrote: “The biggest and most …

Venezuelan government has published a new decree that introduces taxation for operations with cryptocurrency and foreign fiat in its official newspaper Monday, Jan. 7. The decree No. 3,719, published in the Gaceta Oficial edition No. 6,420, is accompanied with another decree that explains the regulatory framework behind the new rules, introduced amid what the newspaper describes as the state of economic emergency. As Cointelegraph in Spanish notes, all citizens who deal with cryptocurrencies or foreign fiat currencies are now obliged to report their income and pay taxes in the same currency they have operated in, and not in the sovereign …

United States retailer Overstock.com has announced it will pay part of its business taxes in the state of Ohio using Bitcoin (BTC), according to an announcement on its website Jan. 3. Overstock will cover commercial activity taxes (CAT) with Bitcoin starting February, using the recently launched cryptocurrency taxpayer platform, OhioCrypto.com. The company’s CEO and founder Patrick Byrne — a longtime crypto enthusiast — said in the announcement that governmental adoption of cryptocurrencies and other emerging technologies, accompanied by friendly legislation, is "the best way to ensure the U.S. does not lose our place at the forefront of the ever-advancing global …

The Chilean General Treasury of the Republic (TGR), which oversees tax collection in the country, has launched a blockchain platform to process payments, according to a press release published Dec. 19. TGR — a dependent institution under the Ministry of Finance — reportedly first met with the Digital Government Division of the Ministry General Secretariat of the Presidency of Chile to discuss the pilot in October, 2018. At that time, officials announced they would create a blockchain platform to connect citizens, financial intermediaries and suppliers. According to the December statement, the pilot for the platform has now been launched. The …

A crypto assets regulatory working group dedicated to crypto and blockchain has been established by the South African (SA) government. English-language local news outlet BusinessLive reported on the development on Jan. 2. Tito Mboweni — the South African finance minister — declared: “It is anticipated that, following broad industry comment and participation, the crypto assets regulatory working group will be ready to release a final research paper on the subject during the course of 2019.” The finance minister further noted that the SA Revenue Service is working to include cryptocurrencies in the tax forms for the next year. The taxation …

The United States government could regulate crypto assets and tokens differently than stocks and traditional assets by altering the existing regulatory framework on securities. On Dec. 22, CNBC reported that two congressmen — Warren Davidson and Darren Solo — have introduced a bipartisan bill entitled “Token Taxonomy Act,” in an effort to prevent over-regulation in the cryptocurrency space. "In the early days of the internet, Congress passed legislation that provided certainty and resisted the temptation to over-regulate the market. Our intent is to achieve a similar win for America's economy and for American leadership in this innovative space," said Davidson. …

An article published Dec. 21 by The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) has suggested investors should sell and then repurchase their Bitcoin (BTC) as a strategy to save on taxes. In the context of the 2018 crypto bear market, the WSJ suggests that “the only good thing about investing in cryptocurrencies [this year] was the tax break.” Given that the United States tax authority, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), has treated crypto as investment property as of 2014 — akin to stocks and bonds, not currency — crypto users can allegedly benefit from the “special and often favorable” taxation policy the …

The lower house of the French parliament has rejected the amendments to the 2019 finance bill which would ease crypto-related taxation. French monthly business magazine Capital reported this Tuesday, Dec. 18. The amendments that have been declined by the National Assembly referred to a draft of the government finance bill for 2019. As explained by local crypto news outlet Bitcoin.fr, the parliament rejected four proposals in total. One of them was to introduce a distinction between regular crypto transactions and occasional ones, offering a more relaxed taxation system for the latter. Another amendment proposed to increase the annual volume of …

The United Kingdom tax collection service published its first detailed tax legislation for private cryptocurrency holders Dec. 19 following a lengthy consultation period. Its new policy paper, “Cryptoassets for Individuals,” sets out likely tax obligations for private investors who buy, sell, get paid in and even lose cryptocurrency. Capping months of uncertainty among U.K. taxpayers over what they need and need not report to authorities about their holdings, the latest information is officially endorsed by tax collection agency HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC). Specifically, individuals will be liable to pay either Capital Gains Tax (CGT) or Income Tax (IT) depending …

Shenzhen, a major city in the Guangdong Province and the first economic special zone in China, will use blockchain technology for electronic tax invoices. This development was reported by the China Economic Net, а domestic news website focusing on economics, on Dec. 12. The Shenzhen Municipal Taxation Bureau and Chinese tech giant Tencent have “successfully connected the blockchain invoice system with the WeChat payment platform.” The article reports that WeChat, the 1 billion user social media platform operated by Tencent, has opened its payment platform for the blockchain invoice function. According to the director of the Information Center of Shenzhen …

Denmark’s tax agency (Skattestyrelsen) has confirmed it is “identifying” 2,700 individuals it says owe taxes on Bitcoin (BTC) gains, according to a Dec. 12 press release. According to Skattestyrelsen, the Danish citizens bought and sold Bitcoin via an unnamed Finnish cryptocurrency exchange between 2015 and 2017, but did not declare any profits or losses on tax documents. Now, the agency will go after each individual with an eye to determining their payment obligations. “Right now we are identifying the individual citizens and keeping the new information up to those we already have,” tax director Karin Bergen commented, continuing: “If something …

Spanish ruling party Partido Popular (PP) will introduce a draft bill on cryptocurrencies and blockchain regulation in a few days, local newspaper La Vanguardia reported Dec. 10. The publication reported that PP’s secretary Teodoro Garcia Egea announced the decision during the opening ceremony of ISDE Blockchain and Law research center in Madrid on Dec. 10. The key reason behind elaborating the regulation is reportedly to provide some grade of certainty to investors and to allow “everyone who wants it” to introduce their own coin, the party’s secretary said. Garcia Egea also hinted at the possibility of tax cuts for blockchain …