Here’s an amusing MarketWatch story by Shawn Langlois on how cryptocurrency traders, presumably having no concept of income, are all bent out of shape about the taxes they owe on their trading gains.
The lead kvetcher, latex_man, posted a thread entitled “I just did my taxes and it turns out I lost almost everything” and let’s all have a good laugh together:
I bought 2 BTC in early 2017. I did a few trades between BTC and dollars but in the end effectively I sold it late in the year for about $40k and changed my mind and bought them back a few hours later. I got weak hands, what can I say.
Anyway, I still got that 2 BTC (and no cash). My accountant said because of my trades, I have to pay like 35% income taxes (short term gains) on it with state and federal, so like $15000. If I sell it now for $10k each I’m only gonna end up with $5k left over. He says I owe $15k by April no matter what happens this year to my bitcoins even though it crashed by 50%.
WTF?
Fuck taxes man. This is so fucked it’s like I didn’t earn anything.
Langlois combed through the comments which are filled with comically bad advice for this forlorn trader, and I have got to imagine there’s a lot of this going on right now. I hope you tax accountants with naive crypto traders as clients are letting them down gently.
[MW]
