Just in time for Japan to have no exchanges to regulate. (Other, I guess, than LocalBitcoin. Which may or may not count, and would be hard to deal with anyway.) Or does someone know of one that doens't show up on any of the charts? Gox is the only JPY exchange I've seen.
Question is: does this help or hurt MtGox's chance of resurrection? Probably makes it less likely to happen, but somewhat more likely that people will come back if it does.
Only in America is a tax increase equated (without any further investigation) to depressing the economy, and a tax break (once again without investigation) equated with letting the peacock that is the economy fly free.
Why do you think their economy has been depressed for over a decade? Every time they show a glimmer of growth, they yank out the rug from underneath by raising taxes.
Is anyone else skeptical of the government's ability to effectively tax bitcoin? The scale of doing so both technologically and physically seems far too complicated for such a minute market.
It doesn't need to be any more sophisticated than the taxing of every other asset that gets traded. When you realize a gain or loss from buying or selling gold bars, train engines or copy machines you're expected to report that.
If you make a lot of money buying and selling Bitcoin, you're probably going through exchanges that are licensed and can be subpoenaed for records if your own are in question. If you are accepting Bitcoin as payment on a website, you're probably using something like Coinbase to facilitate it, which means there are 3rd party records of your income.
If you're trading drugs on Silk Road #3, maybe that won't be taxed, but neither are most cash transactions on Craigslist; the government doesn't attempt to put an auditor in every home to catch every transaction that's supposed to be reported.
Legitimate companies are definitely susceptible to being taxed as they are supposed to report certain parts of their financials. The average consumer will likely be affected by this tax by an increase in the BTC prices they are paying for goods.
This could be strategic to prevent illegitimate companies from using BTC because if they are not paying taxes properly, the government has motivation to investigate the company. Honestly, I think this is probably a good thing because it will make it hard for companies dealing in illegal services to operate (although only slightly).
A concern I have is whether taxing transactions will make it more difficult to make quick and easy transactions on the internet (one of things that makes bitcoin so great).
And, I am also a little skeptical because it will be really hard to enforce even for legitimate companies. I think that if the government wants to support cryptocurrency, and tax it at the same time, then they're going to have create their own cryptocurreny protocol. I almost reckon that they'd need a system where the blockchain was hidden from outsiders (basically, transactions would not be anonymous to the government, and users wouldn't be able to publicly see transactions aside from confirmations from the government).
What challenges does taxing Bitcoin have that are harder than e.g. taxing the exchange of dollars for license keys? Ogaki manages that every year, and I can guarantee you that most people at the office don't even understand what a license key is.
In the US we tax anything that you could remotely consider income. For example if you agree to do some IT work for your dentist in exchange for a couple of fillings, you are supposed to report the fair market value of the transaction and pay tax on it. That is probably hard for the IRS to track down and enforce, but it doesn't stop the tax law from existing.
Where does this idea come from that Bitcoin is somehow special from every other taxable commodity and is somehow harder to tax?
They don't tax Bitcoin, they tax you, and you can evade taxes in any currency or commodity if you're extremely careful and not very risk averse.
Barter is taxable, yard sales are taxable; people don't report them because it's too small to get noticed but if you're making a killing doing it, you're going to get caught.
IMHO this is a watershed event. It recognizes that Bitcoin has perceived value enough that the regulator is compelled to protect consumers. Never mind how regulation can be gamed internationally, the recognition is so significant I'm going to investigate speculating on Bitcoin's future having kept out so far.
In the US, they regulate penny stocks, and those things are only worth a few pennies. The issue isn't the value of the commodity--it's the potential for avoidable loss due to market manipulation.
So I'm guessing this will work on the retailer/exchange side? Any transaction of guaranteed value (i.e. not just shifting wallets, but something like BTC->goods or BTC->cash) will just have a built-in extra cost in JPY equivalent, if the party gaining money is definitely in Japan?
Sounds great to me, though the volume will be very small to begin with. This is a great opportunity for sites and services to demonstrate legitimacy in the eyes of the law and their users. Of course there will be some dark exchanges and the like for those who'd rather not have a tax record attached to their wallet, but for lots of people this will be very beneficial.
> Banks will be also be prohibited from handling bitcoins while securities firms will be barred from brokering bitcoin trades, the Nikkei reported.
Really? Maybe a silly question, but if banks aren't allowed to handle bitcoins... who is? Only individuals? Does this really outlaw ALL bitcoin banks?
Yesterday a kind reader posted a translation of a Mt Gox audio statement from Japanese. I'd be really eager to learn more about what's going on here but I keep running into language barriers.
Well, the existing value in Bitcoin, for one. I'm mining dogecoin largely to learn a little bit about these currencies, but if everyone did move over, by the time it reached the same value Bitcoin has it'd be regulated too.
From what I've read, I doubt the Japanese government (mostly Aso, whose game I'm guessing this is) actually understands that there are other cryptocurrencies.
Similar to "bath salts," that legal trickery may work for a while, but the law will eventually catch up if a government is motivated to stop something.
[+] [-] jccooper|12 years ago|reply
Question is: does this help or hurt MtGox's chance of resurrection? Probably makes it less likely to happen, but somewhat more likely that people will come back if it does.
[+] [-] Cless|12 years ago|reply
So they're actually going through with this, when the economy has been depressed for over a decade...?
[+] [-] thirsteh|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] partoutok|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kaonashi|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] MattyRad|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dangrossman|12 years ago|reply
If you make a lot of money buying and selling Bitcoin, you're probably going through exchanges that are licensed and can be subpoenaed for records if your own are in question. If you are accepting Bitcoin as payment on a website, you're probably using something like Coinbase to facilitate it, which means there are 3rd party records of your income.
If you're trading drugs on Silk Road #3, maybe that won't be taxed, but neither are most cash transactions on Craigslist; the government doesn't attempt to put an auditor in every home to catch every transaction that's supposed to be reported.
[+] [-] thrush|12 years ago|reply
This could be strategic to prevent illegitimate companies from using BTC because if they are not paying taxes properly, the government has motivation to investigate the company. Honestly, I think this is probably a good thing because it will make it hard for companies dealing in illegal services to operate (although only slightly).
A concern I have is whether taxing transactions will make it more difficult to make quick and easy transactions on the internet (one of things that makes bitcoin so great).
And, I am also a little skeptical because it will be really hard to enforce even for legitimate companies. I think that if the government wants to support cryptocurrency, and tax it at the same time, then they're going to have create their own cryptocurreny protocol. I almost reckon that they'd need a system where the blockchain was hidden from outsiders (basically, transactions would not be anonymous to the government, and users wouldn't be able to publicly see transactions aside from confirmations from the government).
[+] [-] patio11|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] minimax|12 years ago|reply
http://www.irs.gov/taxtopics/tc420.html
[+] [-] chc|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gnaritas|12 years ago|reply
They don't tax Bitcoin, they tax you, and you can evade taxes in any currency or commodity if you're extremely careful and not very risk averse.
Barter is taxable, yard sales are taxable; people don't report them because it's too small to get noticed but if you're making a killing doing it, you're going to get caught.
[+] [-] icu|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gamblor956|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] devindotcom|12 years ago|reply
Sounds great to me, though the volume will be very small to begin with. This is a great opportunity for sites and services to demonstrate legitimacy in the eyes of the law and their users. Of course there will be some dark exchanges and the like for those who'd rather not have a tax record attached to their wallet, but for lots of people this will be very beneficial.
[+] [-] dluftdfreheit|12 years ago|reply
Really? Maybe a silly question, but if banks aren't allowed to handle bitcoins... who is? Only individuals? Does this really outlaw ALL bitcoin banks?
Yesterday a kind reader posted a translation of a Mt Gox audio statement from Japanese. I'd be really eager to learn more about what's going on here but I keep running into language barriers.
[+] [-] MBCook|12 years ago|reply
What's to prevent everyone from just moving to Dogecoin or Likecoin or some other substitute to stay off book?
[+] [-] mildtrepidation|12 years ago|reply
From what I've read, I doubt the Japanese government (mostly Aso, whose game I'm guessing this is) actually understands that there are other cryptocurrencies.
[+] [-] gpcz|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Lamza|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lcasela|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bcj|12 years ago|reply