[capableweb]

> And finally, taxes. Imagine owing capital gains tax on top of sales tax? When you buy something in Bitcoin, it’s as if you’re liquidating an asset. In this case, you’ll pay whatever capital gains tax applies to the Bitcoin you liquidated on top of sales taxes for your purchase.

The author seems to misunderstand how the transaction happen and how laws look in a lot of countries.

In many places, the only time you have to pay taxes related to Bitcoin is when you convert it to another currency, be it Euro, American Dollars or Ethereum's Eth, you pay when you change it, and it's usually capital gain tax that gets paid.

By allowing you to buy a Tesla in Bitcoins directly (since Tesla runs their own nodes as well, apparently) you can avoid having to pay those capital gain taxes, as you're not actually realizing any gain, you're using it as a currency and in it's current form. You're not converting your Bitcoin to USD and then use that as purchase, you're purchasing it with Bitcoins directly.

All this is very early though, and I don't know of any court cases so both my opinion and everyone elses are just guesses at this point. Gonna be interesting to see what happens in the future.

Disclaimer: since I'm writing "how laws look in a lot of countries" I'm obviously not putting forward a US-centric view that many replies seems to assume I mean. And also, obviously don't take random advice on the internet regarding tax laws, check your own countries.

[tw04]

So you're an accountant, or a tax lawyer? If not you might want to give that a massive, giant, IANAL because that's not even remotely accurate. So wrong in fact, the IRS specifically calls out the fact that vehicles are not exempt from gains taxation.

https://www.irs.gov/newsroom/like-kind-exchanges-now-limited...

>Effective Jan. 1, 2018, exchanges of personal or intangible property such as machinery, equipment, vehicles, artwork, collectibles, patents, and other intellectual property generally do not qualify for nonrecognition of gain or loss as like-kind exchanges.

[capableweb]

> So you're an accountant, or a tax lawyer? If not you might want to give that a massive, giant, IANAL

No, I'm not and I don't need to disclaim what my profession is either. What is with the internets obsession about "IANAL"? Isn't it more proper to assume that someone is NOT a lawyer, accountant or whatever if they don't say anything, than the opposite? (Irony is that you failed to add "IANAL" to your comment, should I assume you're actually a lawyer?)

Sure, IRS might act like that but not every country, and if you read my comment again you see that my view is broader than just the IRS.

[tw04]

>No, I'm not and I don't need to disclaim what my profession is either. What is with the internets obsession about "IANAL"? Isn't it more proper to assume that someone is NOT a lawyer, accountant or whatever if they don't say anything, than the opposite?

Because it's common online etiquette. Just like when the countless google or amazon employees that hang around HN comment on google or amazon stories, they give the disclaimer: I work for google/amazon.

>Sure, IRS might act like that but not every country, and if you read my comment again you see that my view is broader than just the IRS.

I do see you made a blanket statement that was easily disproven for the US, and at no point did you say that the US wasn't included in "most countries". So exactly which countries are you referring to, and can you provide a citation to the relevant tax authorities for those countries that you referenced when making your original claim?

[dogma1138]

It’s not the just the IRS it’s every tax authority on the planet, you can no more buy a Tesla with bitcoins without triggering a capital gains assessment then you can buy a house from someone by trading in your stock portfolio without accounting for capital gains.

Crypto just makes it easier for the time being because the transaction are not as well regulated or tracked as stocks or other valuable assets.

Fine art is constantly used for example for under the table deals but we have a name for it - tax evasion.

If you bought Bitcoin for £1000 and now it’s worth £100000 if you want to buy something for £100000 you can buy you also need to pay capital gains tax on £99000 worth of gains.

[dogma1138]

That’s not true, converting one asset class into another or in fact any trade would normally trigger a capital gains tax, it’s currently complicated with crypto because it’s new and haven’t been fully tested yet as far as the law goes.

From Tesla’s perspective they don’t care they assume and rightfully so that you are responsible for any taxes and accounting obligations on your end, it’s not any different than buying a Tesla with normal currency from profits you haven’t paid taxes yet on.

It doesn’t even have to be a trade with a mutual exchange, if you say want to gift a house to your kids or your spouse and you transfer ownership you’ll be liable for capitals gain tax even tho no sale has actually occurred.

[cactus2093]

Note that in the US this is completely wrong and bad advice. And I'd be very surprised if there were a lot of countries where it was substantially different, but I don't know for sure about every country.

It's not "just guesses at this point". The IRS has explicitly stated that cryptocurrencies are taxed as assets and subject to normal capital gains. This means they work like every other asset subject to capital gains. I can't transfer shares of stock to a car dealership, or pay with gold coins, to avoid paying capital gains or people would have been doing this forever. And similarly I can't do it with bitcoin. You definitely owe capital gains on the US dollar purchase value of the car minus your cost basis for the amount of bitcoin spent.

I have to say though, I am in awe in some way at the boldness of your claims. What must be going on in your head to take something that you have no idea about, and then just assume without looking into it even a little bit that nobody else could possibly have any idea about it either, and confidently declare that as fact?

[capableweb]

> I have to say though, I am in awe in some way at the boldness of your claims. What must be going on in your head to take something that you have no idea about, and then just assume without looking into it even a little bit that nobody else could possibly have any idea about it either, and confidently declare that as fact?

Let's remember the "Assume good faith" guideline and also remember that not everyone here is having a US-centric view on how things are. Seemingly you read about half of my comment but not the rest, as I never "confidently declare[d] that as fact".

[dogma1138]

Ok let’s play which country you are referring too? I know for a fact that in the UK, Netherlands, Israel and Switzerland it’s not the case.

I can’t think of a single country in the EU either in which you can trade any asset for another without a capital gains assessment.

[0xfaded]

This would definitely not fly in most parts of the world. Taxable events pretty much occur whenever one asset type is converted to another unless explicitly excluded. And since car registration basically ties the car to a named person, it's a particularly difficult form of private consumption to hide.

[modeless]

This is false. It's not an opinion and not a guess. You must calculate capital gains taxes every time you send bitcoins to anyone in exchange for anything.