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Early Bitcoin Investor Roger Ver Charged with Tax Fraud

justice.gov

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Re: Early Bitcoin Investor Roger Ver Charged with Tax Fraud

#31

Post by richtr »

tromp wrote: post #21
Hermel wrote: post #6

More and more countries are implementing an "exit tax" when wealthy people try to give up their citizenship. Also, the US authorities make it increasingly hard to do so. I wouldn't recommend anyone to become a US citizen. Once you are in, it is very costly to get out again.

As a Dutch citizen, I can leave the Netherlands to live elsewhere and no longer have to file Dutch taxes. US citizens have an IRS filing requirement even when living abroad. What other countries behave like the US in this regard?

Sweden has an exit tax rule where they will continue to tax any capital gains worldwide for 10 years after non-residency.

Re: Early Bitcoin Investor Roger Ver Charged with Tax Fraud

#32

Post by hamandcheese »

andrewstuart wrote: post #23

Look, if you owe lots of tax its because you made lots of money. Pay the tax, be happy. I just don't get why some people are so obsessed with not paying tax. You don't have to pay tax when you didn't earn money so stop being so stingy. I know lots of people who go to extraordinary lengths to reduce the amount of tax they will pay even if it means they end up with less money in their pocket . It's crazy. Needing to pa…

I hate taxes because US tax code is pretty slanted against income earners. It just doesn't feel great to take home proportionally less and less as you work harder. We don't treat corporations or capital holders the same way, and that makes me bitter.

Re: Early Bitcoin Investor Roger Ver Charged with Tax Fraud

#33

Post by TarasBob »

repomies69 wrote: post #9
YugyDugan wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[dead]

Bitcoin has worked for me all right for 10+ years. What is exactly wrong with it? At times fees have been a bit higher, but overall I would see the protocol as "good enough". For smaller transactions I have been using Lightning Network and it seems to work all right. The fact that Bitcoin hasn't hard forked for whatever reasons is a positive feature, that outweighs the negatives. You can consider for example Ethereum…

Ethereum is not controlled by Vitalik. Have you actually looked in to how decisions in Ethereum are made?

Re: Early Bitcoin Investor Roger Ver Charged with Tax Fraud

#34

Post by sph »

tromp wrote: post #25
yardstick wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Bitcoin has worked for me all right for 10+ years. What is exactly wrong with it? How much of your Bitcoin usage is associated with crypto investments, vs a replacement for traditional bank transfers and expense payments? I think it has worked well for a lot of people as an investment. Not so much as a replacement to normal money.

Bitcoin was designed as an investment vehicle by its choice of capped supply. Use as a currency would have vastly benefitted from a fixed block subsidy, which also would have avoided much of its current wealth concentration [1]. [1] https://john-tromp.medium.com/a-case-for-using-soft-total-su...

Use as currency is possible with Layer 2 systems like Lightning. The issues I believe are both technological, political and philosophical: apart from the ease of use (or lack thereof), people prefer the currency they need to pay taxes with, and will always prefer the depreciating one, until it stops having any useful value. See the arguments put forth by Saifedean Ammous in his book.

For me the main ledger is equivalent to inter-bank settlement payments. It is not for people to use directly, it is to settle the large amount between "market makers", so $10+ transaction fees are not a problem when the amounts transferred would be in the millions. These settlements are few and far between, they do not require immediate execution. In Bitcoin parlance, these market makers would be Lightning nodes, which I imagine in the long run would not be operated by your Average Joe.

Re: Early Bitcoin Investor Roger Ver Charged with Tax Fraud

#35

Post by notagoodidea »

jimbob45 wrote: post #20
Hermel wrote: post #6

More and more countries are implementing an "exit tax" when wealthy people try to give up their citizenship. Also, the US authorities make it increasingly hard to do so. I wouldn't recommend anyone to become a US citizen. Once you are in, it is very costly to get out again.

Why not just maintain dual citizenship instead of needlessly renouncing?

Some countries don’t allow dual citizenships like the Netherlands and others allow it like Belgium.

Re: Early Bitcoin Investor Roger Ver Charged with Tax Fraud

#36

Post by chefandy »

TheDudeMan wrote: post #5

Interesting title by justice.gov. Tax evasion is illegal regardless of your background / investment portfolio, so why relevant? Sowing sentiment?

> Sowing sentiment?

Yes. Trials are adversarial- persuasion often matters as much or more than facts in formal legal writing. Blog posts presenting reason for prosecuting someone even moreso... Public perception, politics, etc etc etc.

Re: Early Bitcoin Investor Roger Ver Charged with Tax Fraud

#37

Post by trimethylpurine »

tromp wrote: post #21
Hermel wrote: post #6

More and more countries are implementing an "exit tax" when wealthy people try to give up their citizenship. Also, the US authorities make it increasingly hard to do so. I wouldn't recommend anyone to become a US citizen. Once you are in, it is very costly to get out again.

As a Dutch citizen, I can leave the Netherlands to live elsewhere and no longer have to file Dutch taxes. US citizens have an IRS filing requirement even when living abroad. What other countries behave like the US in this regard?

If you're born in the Netherlands and retire to South Korea, will the Netherlands continue to pay you a base income and provide healthcare?

Re: Early Bitcoin Investor Roger Ver Charged with Tax Fraud

#38

Post by throwgh »

Hermel wrote: post #6

More and more countries are implementing an "exit tax" when wealthy people try to give up their citizenship. Also, the US authorities make it increasingly hard to do so. I wouldn't recommend anyone to become a US citizen. Once you are in, it is very costly to get out again.

Many billionaires who move to USA, UK, Canada and Australia are corrupt/oligarchs/tax Dodgers. They are ok even to loose 50% of their wealth to get protection

Re: Early Bitcoin Investor Roger Ver Charged with Tax Fraud

#39

Post by andrewstuart »

hamandcheese wrote: post #32
andrewstuart wrote: post #23

Look, if you owe lots of tax its because you made lots of money. Pay the tax, be happy. I just don't get why some people are so obsessed with not paying tax. You don't have to pay tax when you didn't earn money so stop being so stingy. I know lots of people who go to extraordinary lengths to reduce the amount of tax they will pay even if it means they end up with less money in their pocket . It's crazy. Needing to pa…

I hate taxes because US tax code is pretty slanted against income earners. It just doesn't feel great to take home proportionally less and less as you work harder. We don't treat corporations or capital holders the same way, and that makes me bitter.

I never said you should love taxes.

I'm talking about people who are unreasonably obsessed with paying tax.

Re: Early Bitcoin Investor Roger Ver Charged with Tax Fraud

#40

Post by globular-toast »

andrewstuart wrote: post #23

Look, if you owe lots of tax its because you made lots of money. Pay the tax, be happy. I just don't get why some people are so obsessed with not paying tax. You don't have to pay tax when you didn't earn money so stop being so stingy. I know lots of people who go to extraordinary lengths to reduce the amount of tax they will pay even if it means they end up with less money in their pocket . It's crazy. Needing to pa…

Like many things in life this makes sense when you understand that a large number of people fundamentally believe the world is a zero-sum game. They can only feel like they've won it someone else loses.
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