France's position on Bitcoin (massive taxing on profits)

[alisa20172020]

Such a practice will further reduce the liquidity of bitcoin, because if France levy a high tax rate of 60%, most people will not often trade bitcoins, which will also lead to more scarce bitcoins, and the price will continue to increase.

[Samarkand]

Such a practice will further reduce the liquidity of bitcoin, because if France levy a high tax rate of 60%, most people will not often trade bitcoins, which will also lead to more scarce bitcoins, and the price will continue to increase.

France won´t levy a high tax rate of 60 %. Bitcoin profits will be taxed at your personal income tax rate.
Therefore you will only have to pay really high rates if you fall into one of the high personal income tax
brackets.

Most people will not make enough money to be in one of the top tax brackets.

[Taki]

If taxation system would be so easy in that country why such mass media faces as Depardieu would take Russian citizenship?! It is obviously not so easy and I suppose all people who get profit from crypto will cry soon from all those taxes. But yes, it is definitely better than banning, just like you say.

[eaLiTy]

If this news is true and the government planning to impose such a big tax is just ridiculous ,people will find a way to over come those kind of taxes,if they really wanted to play fair,they have to come up with fair taxes and not the skim off such a huge profit in the name of tax,but i am still not sure how authentic this news is as i have read yesterday that they are allowing trading of unlisted securities with the help of blockchain and i have not heard about this taxation news .

[HasHe]

60%!?!?!?!? What the actual f***??

 If that's the case, screw declaring taxes. If I was in your position I'd rather go with localbitcoins and do transaction meetups instead of buying off Coinbase or other similar services, so I could pay with paper money instead, which is quite untraceable. As if bitcoin's volatility isn't scary enough. Now french people have to pay up to 60% tax. Yikes.

Is that site:  https://www.lesechos.fr/ a valid or trustworthy source of information though? Not a French person, so I really don't know.

Bitcoin has not been yet taxed in my country.So,now i am enjoying a tax free earning from bitcoins.But if our government decides to tax bitcoin,then i too would use localbitcoins and buy bitcoins directly from the seller instead of paying by bank transfer.That would be safe for me.

[Cammo01]

 ???Yet how would they know what you bought and sold for?! And how much?!

[junoreactor]

???Yet how would they know what you bought and sold for?! And how much?!

When you transfered the money to your bank account, especially if it is a big amount, they will put their nose on it and you will need to provide evidence of your different transactions.
That is how I see it. But this is just talk for now, and I am waiting to see how exactly they will implement it.
In my case for instance, I used a bank card registered overseas, so it is not easy for them to find what amount I spent to buy (not to mention Bitcoin earned in signature campaigns or affiliate programs).

[JohnBitCo]

Actually Up to 60% (will edit my post), but yeah when you get "kind of rich" in this country, you are screwed.

60% is too much. Why don't they take Japan for example. We haven't heard any of its citizens complaining which is a good sign that the tax is nice and not that heavy and won't interefere making profits. I think your government should learn a thing or two. And like you said, French people (and any other people in the world) can leave their country amd search for a much fairer government as long as you have what it takes.

That's a way lot of tax amount. 60% on profits. The government think that people will give that much taxes  ? No, they wont. With bitcoins they will hide their profits and earnings and will find ways of deceiving the government. Would not it be better if government would have announce 10 percent taxes and everyone would have paid their taxes happily and there would have been no black money etc.

[gentlemand]

You only have to pay tax when you sell back into fiat right? If more and more places start accepting crypto directly this won't happen. Also coins like Monero stand to gain a lot from this sort of legislation.

Totally depends on your jurisdiction. Many places would regard crypto to crypto as a taxable disposal.

In the UK it's capital gains at 20% which seems bearable enough to me. I'm unsurprised France would do this. I have relatives in France and it's pretty darned communist when you scratch the surface. I'm amazed it functions as an economy considering how overbearing the state is there.

[mrcash02]

I thought France were more liberal than this. No one will follow this rule, people will use banks of another countries to convert their profits from BTC to fiat. 60% taxes are unproportional and inadequate. I think they should apply another kind of rule, instead of paying 60% to the government, people should use 60% of their profit to buy things on the country, to help local economy. This way all the parts gain.

[gentlemand]

I thought France were more liberal than this. No one will follow this rule, people will use banks of another countries to convert their profits from BTC to fiat. 60% taxes are unproportional and inadequate. I think they should apply another kind of rule, instead of paying 60% to the government, people should use 60% of their profit to buy things on the country, to help local economy. This way all the parts gain.

Hey, it's a socialist country but it's not THAT socialist.

It would be fascinating to see what effect punitive taxes like this would have on a young EU population if crypto was widespread. It's an extra incentive to give another country a try.

They do not deserve so much of our money.

[tech72]

How much is the tax? Also, it is good thing that they are introducing taxes instead of banning the bitcoin trades. This is definitely a positive step for bitcoins. All countries don't have clear guidelines for Bitcoins. Some steps or initiative like this will definitely boost Bitcoin as it will become legal to hold or trade bitcoins.

[eternalgloom]

You only have to pay tax when you sell back into fiat right? If more and more places start accepting crypto directly this won't happen. Also coins like Monero stand to gain a lot from this sort of legislation.

Totally depends on your jurisdiction. Many places would regard crypto to crypto as a taxable disposal.

In the UK it's capital gains at 20% which seems bearable enough to me. I'm unsurprised France would do this. I have relatives in France and it's pretty darned communist when you scratch the surface. I'm amazed it functions as an economy considering how overbearing the state is there.

Luckily my country doesn't tax crypto to crypto as a taxable disposal, but they do tax you when you convert it to fiat.

And yeah, France isn't a great country to be rich in, they've had so many socialist governments in the past.
Remember when they implemented a 75% super tax back when Hollande was president?

[junoreactor]

You only have to pay tax when you sell back into fiat right? If more and more places start accepting crypto directly this won't happen. Also coins like Monero stand to gain a lot from this sort of legislation.

Totally depends on your jurisdiction. Many places would regard crypto to crypto as a taxable disposal.

In the UK it's capital gains at 20% which seems bearable enough to me. I'm unsurprised France would do this. I have relatives in France and it's pretty darned communist when you scratch the surface. I'm amazed it functions as an economy considering how overbearing the state is there.

Luckily my country doesn't tax crypto to crypto as a taxable disposal, but they do tax you when you convert it to fiat.

And yeah, France isn't a great country to be rich in, they've had so many socialist governments in the past.
Remember when they implemented a 75% super tax back when Hollande was president?

Actually Hollande was seriously considering to implement this 75% tax but he did not. He realized it would be a disaster if he did. That was planned to aim yearly incomes overtaking 1 million EUROS, but then even politicians from his party agreed to say it was a bad idea. Socialism is just not good anyway when you live in a liberal economic system, but that's my personal opinion.

[Pan Troglodytes]

60%!?!?!?!? What the actual f***??

 If that's the case, screw declaring taxes. If I was in your position I'd rather go with localbitcoins and do transaction meetups instead of buying off Coinbase or other similar services, so I could pay with paper money instead, which is quite untraceable. As if bitcoin's volatility isn't scary enough. Now french people have to pay up to 60% tax. Yikes.

Is that site:  https://www.lesechos.fr/ a valid or trustworthy source of information though? Not a French person, so I really don't know.

Actually Up to 60% (will edit my post), but yeah when you get "kind of rich" in this country, you are screwed. Government still don't understand that citizens are as free as ever to leave the country when they feel they get stolen from tax administration.

Yeah this website is reliable I believe, but like said in my first post, I am not even surprised they intend to tax 60% on the biggest profits (my guess is that it should aim 6 figures profits, but yeah... shameful).

this is not a surprise that the governments will try to get as much profit as possible. The moment they noticed that bitcoin is not only the hype for geeks, but it is a real thing for the average Joe, the average Joe gets screwd. So nihil novi sub sole.

[Samarkand]

...Actually Hollande was seriously considering to implement this 75% tax but he did not. He realized it would be a disaster if he did. ...

Actually Hollande did implement the wealth tax. However, he had to drop it after huge public
criticism and missing success of the wealth tax.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/dec/31/france-drops-75percent-supertax

François Hollande’s unpopular tax changes that imposed a 75% rate
on earnings above €1m (£780,000) will quietly disappear into the history books from Thursday.

Finance ministry studies showed that despite all the publicity, the sums obtained
from the supertax were meagre, standing at €260m in 2013 and €160m
in 2014, and affecting 1,000 staff in 470 companies. Over the same period, the budget deficit soared to €84.7bn.

[junoreactor]

...Actually Hollande was seriously considering to implement this 75% tax but he did not. He realized it would be a disaster if he did. ...

Actually Hollande did implement the wealth tax. However, he had to drop it after huge public
criticism and missing success of the wealth tax.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/dec/31/france-drops-75percent-supertax

François Hollande’s unpopular tax changes that imposed a 75% rate
on earnings above €1m (£780,000) will quietly disappear into the history books from Thursday.

Finance ministry studies showed that despite all the publicity, the sums obtained
from the supertax were meagre, standing at €260m in 2013 and €160m
in 2014, and affecting 1,000 staff in 470 companies. Over the same period, the budget deficit soared to €84.7bn.

Ok I stand corrected then, it is strange because I was living in France back then and cannot remember he did implement it (I do remember all the discussions and criticizes around it though)  

[babar123]

60%!?!?!?!? What the actual f***??

 If that's the case, screw declaring taxes. If I was in your position I'd rather go with localbitcoins and do transaction meetups instead of buying off Coinbase or other similar services, so I could pay with paper money instead, which is quite untraceable. As if bitcoin's volatility isn't scary enough. Now french people have to pay up to 60% tax. Yikes.

Is that site:  https://www.lesechos.fr/ a valid or trustworthy source of information though? Not a French person, so I really don't know.

no, it can reach 80%, (they didnt count social tax of independant worker and missing of charterred acountant right in time (+25% of the cost basis))
so yes, 80% tax on profit for daytrader making more than a hundred k

[pooya87]

they are practically telling their people to either stop trading cryptocurrencies or start trading them off the market and away from government eyes! and this will only hurt the average Joes with small investments because they have to pay taxes and the big players will just move on to other methods of trading so that they don't have to pay the outrageous taxes.