The United Kingdom (UK) tax authority, Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs (HMRC), has taken the first steps toward recovering tax that it believes may be outstanding from UK resident cryptocurrency investors: it has been reported that several crypto exchanges have received demands from HMRC relating to customer details and their transactional activity.
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As reported in the July 26, 2019 Hunton Andrews Kurth LLP client alert, first France and now the United Kingdom have joined the growing number of European countries that have, in recent months, announced they are considering a new form of tax specifically directed at “digital” businesses. The new form of digital services tax is based on the premise that traditional methods of profit allocation between different countries are no longer fit for their purpose and that, in the context of “digital businesses”, a fresh approach needs to be adopted that takes into account the value added by the business’s user base.
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The year 2018 was a busy one for the SEC in the digital asset space, with the agency cementing its role as the primary de facto regulator of crypto finance in the United States.
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The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (“CFTC”) recently published a detailed primer on smart contracts. The Primer discusses their functionality, use cases, regulatory environment and potential risks.
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Ohio is the first state in the United States to accept tax payments in cryptocurrency. Starting today, December 3, 2018, companies operating in Ohio can elect to pay certain Ohio state taxes in Bitcoin.
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As reported on the Hunton Insurance Recovery Blog, in what appears to be a case of first impression, an Ohio trial court ruled in Kimmelman v. Wayne Insurance Group that the crypto-currency, Bitcoin, constitutes personal property in the context of a first-party homeowners’ insurance policy and, therefore, its theft would not be subject to the policy’s $200 sublimit for loss of “money.”
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Interest in the crypto economy continues to grow in Congress with the introduction of roundtables, hearings and new legislation.
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Recently, Canadian investment firm First Block Capital Inc. reported that FBC Bitcoin Trust, which the firm bills as the “first and only open-ended bitcoin fund approved by Canadian regulators,” has achieved mutual fund trust status under Canada’s Federal Income Tax Act.
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