Bitcoin Forum

South Africa’s Tax Agency Targets Tax-Evading Cryptocurrency Traders
South Africa’s tax agency is looking into methods for identifying tax-dodging cryptocurrency traders, the acting head of the authority has revealed.

The South African Revenue Service (SARS) is studying ways to spot non-compliant cryptocurrency traders in order to investigate any scenario of failure to declare profits from investments, acting Commissioner Mark Kingon said while speaking at the Institute of Internal Auditors SA conference in Johannesburg recently.

As reported by Fin 24, the official explained the need to identify crypto traders, stating:

“The key thing is identifying people who are trading because it’s easy to say cryptocurrency gains must be deductible, but there are also those who lose. That’s why it’s important to identify the trader.”

A noncompliant trader would be investigated after being identified, the official remarked, pointing to a money trail by suggesting that most traders used credit cards to buy into cryptocurrencies.
https://www.ccn.com/south-africa-target-evading-cryptocurrency-traders/

This is the symptom of a country that is ignorant of the future of cryptocurrency. They are now choosing to target and strangle a developing crypto-economy. Soon, successful traders will seek safe haven elsewhere, migrating to other countries.

Tax-targeting is how Spain pursued Ronaldo to Italy. Now, the Italy's economy is better for it!

Reading the article, its shows they don't have a clue about how to go about it and in the long run, they will only be looking for scapegoat to make an example out of and nothing more. However, its really not a good thing for people engaging in crypto currency to use it as a means of evading tax especially in an environment that has made it possible to do the right thing compared to others who have chosen to go the negative route by choosing to ban the crypto currency.

When it comes to the issue of tax, the onus is always on the tax payer to declare and pay even for companies that they can carry out audit activities which should even be more pronounced in crypto because of the difficulty in tracking or doing any form of audit activities. For the sake of not giving the government of South Africa the reason to go on the defensive and reason for other countries to not to allow a thriving environment, enthusiasts needs to start doing the right thing.

Well, this is hardly news. All income, and that includes capital gains from cryptocurrencies, shall be declared and taxed. That's the way it is in most countries. I guess successful might go and look elsewhere, unless of course, the tax rate is very low. Too bad, the article's author forgot to mention it.

Maybe their current regulation policies need more justification and improvement so that these tax evaders will not bypass the local exchange and the government so easily. Paying Bitcoin tax is an obligation in which every crypto users must comply or their government will ban Crypto investments in their area.

@audaciousbeing, scapegoats or just small to middle crypto traders. I agree that the article is somewhat vague as this point and it looks like they are chasing something or someone without the proper tools. I'm looking like they are going to used chain analysis or something to track potential suspects (tax evasion). Anyways, At least though they are very open and can consider very friendly nation and I hope that at least we see someone very honest and reports everything.  ;D

This is what I was going to say.

While many may not agree with taxes, and more specifically taxing cryptocurrency, it is a currency and with that will need some form of taxing with the way out global economy and standards for regulations are. It is the way it is. I think the original image and blossoming of Bitcoin led the cryptocurrency industry to a place where users want more privacy than they usually are getting in a transactional world.

I see nothing wrong if a country levies tax on people's income especially if the country is a tax country and not that it just woke up someday to start taxing people because they are cryptocurrency traders. Moreover, it is targeted at gainers and not just anybody.

The thing with Bitcoin is that it's not just a currency. It's a way to escape from a system that has been terrorizing people for plenty of decades.

For the first ever time people have a convenient way of storing wealth outside the regular channels that are in control of financial institutions and thus governments. I support anyone to to embrace that freedom and not continue to signal slave-like willingness to abide by any rule the government comes up with.

Good thing about the African market is that a lot activity is happening locally, so for these people there are no centralized exchanges that can be used to trap them in. In the end we all have a choice. It's using centralized exchanges and accept paying due taxes, or just avoid them entirely and remain under the radar for ever conducting only peer to peer transactions. The latter is the ultimate goal.

What a double faced statement! What a reason to identify the traders who loose!! I mean, is it even making sense to anyone??

While the reason is to catch tax evaders, they are disguising the reason into grandfatherly concern!! While I don't support tax evasion of any form, but I also don't support such false concerns that politicians and beaurocrats make!

I really don't understand why most countries jump on the taxes bandwagon when they don't even recognise cryptocurrencies in general. Is it about wanting a slice of that cake, or are they just doing their best to strangle their citizens even more?

But why is it that countries shy away from making a statement of legalizing it. They forbid something and yet want to benefit from that same thing. This is not right in my view that countries will not want to accept the use of bitcoin but they will go around with hammers, chasing people who are taking individual risk on it.

They don't want to because of some level of protection that will be required from them too.

Governments will take taxes no matter of what because we literally are working as slaves for our governments because we need to work hard and pay our taxes of we made any income but our governments won't take any initiative to increase employment opportunities such a very good political system. ::) But we are liable to pay taxes if any income we made because all governments have income tax policies if the crypto currency made legal they will ask for more taxes.

Tax evasion is a serious issue that hampers the economic development of a nation. So the authorities look out for all the possible methods to find and punish the culprits.


Exactly, if you're earning then you have to pay taxes, if the income earned falls within the capacity of the law of the land. But what if your government don't support the crypto market and regulate it with the strictier implications. Then obviously nobody would want to pay taxes on the same. So it is surely a two-way mechanism and needs the participation of the authorities as well on friendly terms!!

So they are under the assumption of all traders are tax evaders now? This would be really a waste of time and money if you are one of the traders who are paying the right taxes. This is the wrong assumption to make as they are leaving behind some of the most important targets and that are people who are sending BTC straight away with their wallets, if they know that the SARS is on to traders what they can simply do is to stay away there and do the transactions directly with their wallets. What should they be doing is issuing KYC requirements and AML compliances in both exchanges as well as local wallet providers if they have none.