Germany: Bitcoin Is "Private Money" 223
hypnosec writes "Germany has declared Bitcoin as a 'unit of account', which makes the virtual currency a kind of 'private money' and the process of Bitcoin mining has been deemed 'private money creation.' The recognition as 'unit of account' makes Bitcoin eligible for use in "multilateral clearing circles" and because of this citizens are liable to pay capital gains tax, if they profit from the crypto-currency by sale or purchase within a period of one year – the same as they would have to in case they profit by selling stock, bonds or other form of security. The question here is how the finance ministry would come to know of a person's Bitcoin holding as it is a decentralized currency with no governing body to keep count on the number of Bitcoins a person has. The German government expects that citizens declare their Bitcoin while filing their annual tax return."
Re:I'm out. Thank God (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/national_world/2013/07/06/Germany-strikes-deal-to-help-U-S-catch-tax-evaders.html [dispatch.com]
It could be same hold as the IRS has over the Swiss banks?
http://finance.fortune.cnn.com/2013/05/30/swiss-bank-accounts-irs/ [cnn.com]
http://www.forbes.com/sites/robertwood/2013/07/09/swiss-banks-reveal-americans-u-k-deal-sputters-and-germany-embraces-fatca/ [forbes.com]
Re:I'm out. Thank God (Score:4, Informative)
Way back when, I placed a pre-order on a small BitCoin miner from Butterfly Labs. Later they sent me an e-mail wanting to know if I wanted to continue with the order, or get a refund back to my PayPal account. I chose the refund. Thank God!
Good move. Butterfly Labs has a large number of angry customers on the Bitcoin forums. They deliver months late or not at all. The Bitcoin "difficulty" level is now increasing so fast that late hardware is unprofitable when delivered.