Cryptocurrency lobbyists pushed to get a change to the bipartisan infrastructure bill that reduces a bit of the mandate thrust upon the sector, The New York Times reported on Monday (Aug. 2).
The infrastructure bill included last-minute additions that called for increased scrutiny into the crypto sector that would subject traders to the same IRS rules as stock and bond brokers.
The lobbying push by the cryptocurrency industry succeeded in having the language revised by lawmakers to “clarify” what defines a broker.
The bill also revised wording that focused on “any decentralized exchange or peer-to-peer marketplace,” according to the news outlet. Instead, the phrasing was changed to a wider definition as brokers being someone “responsible for regularly providing any service effectuating transfers of digital assets on behalf of another person.”
The cryptocurrency sector has maintained that the increased tax enforcement should not apply to a number of industry players — miners, creators, or “node operators,” per the Times.
The crypto industry raised the alarms last week when it discovered that new tax and reporting mandates were added to the infrastructure bill at the last minute. The revisions are intended to ease some concerns. The measures added to the bill were projected to bring in some $28 billion across the next 10 years.
Industry lobbyists pushed the Senate to offer further clarity that the crypto sector would be excluded from the legislation. Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) is one policymaker the crypto industry has in its court regarding the law’s intent. The industry is still waiting for affirmations from the Treasury Department before the law goes to President Joe Biden’s desk for his signature.
As originally proposed, the infrastructure bill included a provision that would give the IRS the power to go after taxes owed from crypto transactions it wasn’t aware of due to a lack of requirements for filing.
Read more: Crypto Tax Laws Slipped Into $1T Infrastructure Bill
The IRS had already been working on boosting oversight into the industry and called for transactions $10,000 and more to be reported.
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