What the IRS Summons Will Mean for Coinbase Users
I’m a bitcoin and cryptocurrency accountant, and I don’t have good news: The IRS hammer is coming down. Although the IRS issued guidance in March 2014 concerning income from bitcoin and "virtual currencies" (the IRS term), there has been no enforcement mechanism to ensure that bitcoin income is actually reported to the IRS. Having failed to create an enforcement mechanism, the IRS is taking a brute-force approach. The John Doe summons authorized on 30th November demands that Coinbase provide complete transaction records for all users between 30th December 2013 and 30th December....
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Jeffrey Berns, an attorney representing Coinbase in its legal fight against the Internal Revenue Service summons to provide customer information, recently filed a response to the “John Doe” summons, asking the court to quash the summons in its entirety, order a limited hearing and discovery into government’s good faith, or reconsider its decision to grant the IRS petition. Berns’ motion calls the IRS summons “unprecedented use” of the IRS John Doe summons procedure. Coinbase has said it is committed to customer privacy and opposes the government’s efforts to gain customer information.....
Is the John Doe summons issued by IRS to Coinbase valid and falls within the guidelines of the department? The eyes of the cryptocurrency community are on Coinbase ever since it got served with a John Doe summons by the IRS. The summon requires Coinbase to hand over all information pertaining to the platform’s users between 2013 and 2015. The issue of generic, blanket information request by the IRS has given rise to few questions regarding the powers of the government institution and constitutional rights of individuals. Even though Coinbase has filed an appeal against the summons in the....
IRS should have done better to make it easier for the cryptocurrency community to file taxes instead of labeling all Coinbase users as potential tax evaders. The recent incident involving Coinbase and IRS is well known. The US government department responsible for enforcing tax compliance had issued a John Doe summons to the leading cryptocurrency platform. The summons demanded the company to furnish details about all its customers, their entire transaction history from 2013 till 2015 and any other information associated with their accounts. The demands of IRS have been contested by....
The Federal Court of Northern California District rules in favor of the John Doe summons issued on behalf of the IRS to Coinbase. Bad news for the Bitcoin community! In the days following Internal Revenue Service’s (IRS) John Doe summons to Coinbase, the federal court in the Northern District of California has ruled in favor of the department. The ruling comes after Coinbase filed an appeal, seeking clarification about the extent of IRS authority and validity of the summons. With the latest ruling authorizing the IRS to serve John Doe summons to Coinbase, the digital currency platform will....
On November 17, the IRS filled a “John Doe” summons targeting transaction records of prominent bitcoin company Coinbase’s bitcoiners registered between January 2013 and December 2015. At the time, the exchange argued it takes user privacy very seriously, and as such it would work towards protecting it. On December 1, a federal judge approved the IRS summons, and demanded Coinbase to reveal user transaction records. Soon, a Coinbase customer named Jeffrey K. Berns, who is also a lawyer, filed a motion to block the IRS’ efforts to access Coinbase users’ records. Since the IRS filed a John....