A court in Washington D.C. ruled BTC as money yesterday, while the IRS continues to define it as property...
So, what is bitcoin exactly?
That all depends on who you ask!
The IRS has basically kept the same definition of bitcoin since they first commented on it back in 2013, and that was to label it as property, which basically means you treat bitcoin the same way you would say... a house.
That makes complete sense right?
Nope, and it's been something that has made recording and paying taxes on bitcoin transactions annoying, difficult, and not a whole lot of fun.
It's actually been one of the major hindrances with bitcoin being accepted at more retail locations as a form of payment.
What makes it even worse is that the CFTC defines bitcoin as a commodity, making the CFTC the defacto regulator, while FinCEN and several courts define bitcoin as a form of money, and to top it all off the SEC seems to have wanted to define it as a security...
Sheesh!
So, which one is it?
Adding to this confusion was a ruling that a court in Washington D.C. made yesterday where they defined bitcoin as a form of money, making it subject to financial services laws...
The ruling can be seen here:
https://news.bloomberglaw.com/banking-law/bitcoin-deemed-money-under-d-c-financial-services-law
If you have been wondering why the actual adoption and use of bitcoin has been somewhat slow to really catch in despite its popularity, look no further than this mismatch of legal definitions by regulatory authorities.
It's no wonder that most banks have stayed away from it!
(And all the more reason why the clarity from the Comptroller of the Currency about banks being able to custody bitcoin/crypto was so important the other day)
At some point all these different regulator agencies are going to need to get together and come to some sort of agreement as to what exactly bitcoin is and how it should be regulated.
As it stands now, we are still a long ways away from that and it's one of the biggest hindrances from bitcoin adoption and growth really taking off.
Stay informed my friends.
-Doc
Posted Using LeoFinance
It is a digital asset but more complicated based on who will be debating about it @jrcornel :D
It all depends on which regulator you are dealing with I guess...
Governments just want to find out how best to justify either co-opting it or forbidding it.
It has features of several categories which I think makes it extremely hard to classify via existing laws. Perhaps it's time to write some new laws and come up with a new category/classification entirely...
Or time to recognize the inadequacy and abuse of government laws.
Does it really matter what governments classify it as yet? As far as I'm concerned they shouldn't even be involved. I know some people feel we need to play ball, but I don't see why we need to, let them come to us
Well yes it matters when they write the laws and then enforce those laws with imprisonment.