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Today marks one month until tax season for individual taxpayers opens, with July 1 the day we all scramble to remember our eFiling passwords.

SARS has made it clear that this year, it’s taking extra measures to avoid taxes slipping through the net.

Last month, it sent out letters to wealthy South Africans, announcing the establishment of a high wealth individuals unit, with the aim of enhancing compliance among, and increasing collections from, these individuals.

Now SARS is turning its attention towards the trading of cryptocurrencies, reports Moneyweb:

SA’s three largest crypto exchanges – AltCoinTrader, Luno, and VALR – say they have been approached by SARS as part of a tax risk assessment exercise on SA residents involved in “the mining, speculation and/or investment in crypto assets”.

In 2018 SARS released a media statement entitled ‘SARS stance on the tax treatment of cryptocurrencies’ in which it remined taxpayers to declare all cryptocurrency-related taxable income during the year such income was received or accrued.

Just when you think you’re getting the hang of filing your own taxes, something like this comes along.

What about losses? Do you minus the fees you pay for using the crypto exchanges? Can I ask Elon Musk to cover me, given that his tweets started much of the recent chaos?

I’ll be sending out the Bat-Signal to our resident tax experts, Galbraith | Rushby, to avoid ageing a decade during the filing process.

The three crypto exchanges mentioned said in a joint statement that they have complied with handing over the information requested by SARS, due to legal obligations:

…they have been approached by SARS for information on a “selection of customers in terms of Section 46 of the Tax Administration Act, 2011″.

“SARS has confirmed that the primary purpose of collecting this information is for risk analysis, which will inform the need for future action with respect to crypto assets,” they add.

At present, crypto exchanges are not are required by law to provide customers with tax certificates, but AltCoinTrader, Luno, and VALR say customers are able to download their transaction history to work out their own tax declarations.

That’s always a great deal of fun.

In the words of a Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? contestant, I’d like to phone a friend, please.

[source:moneyweb]