Whether you like it or not, if you invest in cryptocurrencies and you make some money, the government wants a piece of the pie.
Over this last weekend bitcoin jumped back up over the 9000 mark after being down from last year over 30%. This in part is being blamed on US tax laws. The co founder and head of research Tom Lee, at Fundstrat Global Advisors, estimated U.S. households owed $25 billion in taxes on their cryptocurrency during the rise to $20,000 in 2017.
The IRS views Cryptocurrencies as property and any profits gained from exchanging them are subject to the government taking and lining their pockets with your money.
SO, my question for you...Should cryptocurrencies be taxed by the federal government? and should the IRS have access to Coinbase to check records?
Taxing seems justified. For any governmental structure to function, this is required. It would be great if the tax funds went towards educating regulators about blockchain/cryptos. However, categorizing cryptos as property may not be the best decision. Currency definitions or more commodity like features underlying cryptos seems as though the IRS is profiting as much as possible while the regulatory framework gets sorted out. This could invariably deter innovation. Record access by the government happens all the time, e.g., NSA, so the IRS seeking those records does not seem like much of a stretch. If it deters fraudulent use, then it does not seem too egregious of a move considering everything else the Federal Gov't does.
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