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Finland tax authorities matching Bitcoin transactions and bank transfers

metropolitan.fi

31–40 of 147 posts

Re: Finland tax authorities matching Bitcoin transactions and bank transfers

#32
post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is even worse if you are a student who receives government aids: transactions are regarded as income (whether loss or profit) by the social insurance institution. So in other words, if you buy Bitcoin for 1000 euros and sell it at 500, you have made efficiently 500 euros in "income." With the notion of the parent post, this makes trading unviable, because if you exceed 12K€ in income a year (in any form, be that…

Whilst the apparent double counting doesn't seem fair, it also doesn't seem like a good idea for students who rely on government aid for their living costs to be speculating in risky exotic financial assets...

This is kind of off topic but we should really get rid of all income thresholds for government services and safety nets. They divide people and make them resent one another. I think we should instead make these programs available to all otherwise qualifying applicants (New York excelsior can keep the state residency requirement but should not be allowed to say it applies only to people who make under $125k a year).

If we "can't afford" to offer a program to all qualifying people regardless of income that means we don't have the political will to make the program happen and should get rid of it.

Re: Finland tax authorities matching Bitcoin transactions and bank transfers

#33
post #13
post #7

All they're doing is looking for bank transactions to crypto exchanges in citizens' accounts. What this article doesn't tell, is that the current cryptocurrency taxation in Finland is unreasonable. You pay 30-34% tax on any profit, but you can not deduct losses. If you had bought 1 BTC at $1000, another at $14000, and sold both at $3000 you would owe $600 in taxes even though you lost $9000. You can imagine how peopl…

You pay 30-34% tax on any profit, but you can not deduct losses. Whether you made a profit or not doesn't have to be a consideration as far as tax goes. You pay a percentage of the capital amount when you choose to liquidate your asset. It's effectively a wealth tax. There are lots of taxes around the world that work this way. It sucks if you've made a loss, but that's not really the government's problem.

> It's effectively a wealth tax.

No, it's a 30-34% wealth tax! (Or better, transaction tax.)

Re: Finland tax authorities matching Bitcoin transactions and bank transfers

#34
post #22
post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You pay 30-34% tax on any profit, but you can not deduct losses. Whether you made a profit or not doesn't have to be a consideration as far as tax goes. You pay a percentage of the capital amount when you choose to liquidate your asset. It's effectively a wealth tax. There are lots of taxes around the world that work this way. It sucks if you've made a loss, but that's not really the government's problem.

That doesn't sound right. The authorities in Finland specifically tax gains made with cryptocurrencies. You only pay tax if you make profit on any individual trade. But you can not deduct trades that made a loss. It's not exactly a wealth tax, but it's also hard to consider a capital gains tax because you can't deduct losses. Treating other investment products this way would probably have horrific results, because it…

This does sound strange. My understanding is that here in the US if you win a huge jackpot at a casino but then spend it all on slots (I don't know how or why anyone would do that but this is a thought experiment) over the year, you effectively don't owe any income tax on that jackpot.

Re: Finland tax authorities matching Bitcoin transactions and bank transfers

#35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If a student has money to gamble on Bitcoin, perhaps they don't deserve the grants.

Getting in early was an option as well.

In that case they wouldn’t be showing losses, though, would they?

Re: Finland tax authorities matching Bitcoin transactions and bank transfers

#37
post #7

All they're doing is looking for bank transactions to crypto exchanges in citizens' accounts. What this article doesn't tell, is that the current cryptocurrency taxation in Finland is unreasonable. You pay 30-34% tax on any profit, but you can not deduct losses. If you had bought 1 BTC at $1000, another at $14000, and sold both at $3000 you would owe $600 in taxes even though you lost $9000. You can imagine how peopl…

The hodl subsidy

Re: Finland tax authorities matching Bitcoin transactions and bank transfers

#38
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whilst the apparent double counting doesn't seem fair, it also doesn't seem like a good idea for students who rely on government aid for their living costs to be speculating in risky exotic financial assets...

This is kind of off topic but we should really get rid of all income thresholds for government services and safety nets. They divide people and make them resent one another. I think we should instead make these programs available to all otherwise qualifying applicants (New York excelsior can keep the state residency requirement but should not be allowed to say it applies only to people who make under $125k a year). I…

On the whole I think there's likely to be rather more resentment bred by cutting the subsidies of people that need them to ensure people that don't need them have equal access...

Re: Finland tax authorities matching Bitcoin transactions and bank transfers

#39
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty trivial for a nation state, given sufficient motivation.

Not if it's something like Monero.

They can still require mandatory reporting when real money enters and leaves the system. Everyone is going to need to convert currency into Monero or vice versa and governments routinely require disclosure information at such points.

Re: Finland tax authorities matching Bitcoin transactions and bank transfers

#40
post #7

All they're doing is looking for bank transactions to crypto exchanges in citizens' accounts. What this article doesn't tell, is that the current cryptocurrency taxation in Finland is unreasonable. You pay 30-34% tax on any profit, but you can not deduct losses. If you had bought 1 BTC at $1000, another at $14000, and sold both at $3000 you would owe $600 in taxes even though you lost $9000. You can imagine how peopl…

Is this really the case? My expectation would be that you would be taxed on the net profits at the end of the year but would have no deductions on net losses at the end of the year. It's a bit skewed but I'm pretty sure that's how profits from overseas online gambling is taxed here in Denmark.

Either way, it would make sense to tax cryptocurrency trading by using the same tax code as other kinds of overseas online gambling.

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