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Binance Australia partners with Koinly for tax reports as ATO ramps up compliance

July 22, 2021 Coin Telegraph

Australia

The taxman commeth for Australian crypto investors and Binance wants to help them out.

The Australian branch of leading cryptocurrency exchange Binance has increased the ability for users to accurately report tax liabilities amidst increased pressure from local tax authorities.

Binance has partnered with cryptocurrency tax startup Koinly to assist users grappling with ever-increasing tax obligations down under. Binance users in Australia have been offered access to Koinly’s tax reporting solution through the integration.

Koinly was founded in 2018 and supports over 600 exchanges and wallets, enabling users to sync their full crypto trading history with one central ATO-compliant platform.

The move comes as the Australian Tax Office (ATO) increases its effort to collect taxes on cryptocurrency gains. In July last year, the ATO targeted 350,000 crypto asset investors and holders with a letter regarding undeclared cryptocurrency gains.

In May 2021, the ATO doubled down with its efforts, reminding 100,000 Australian crypto users to report all gains on their tax returns — with a further 300,000 people expected to be prompted to do so as they lodge their returns. It estimated that there are over 600,000 taxpayers that have invested in crypto-assets in recent years. The ATO uses data matching with exchanges to identify users who may have tax bills.

In an announcement shared with Cointelegraph, Koinly founder Robin Singh explained:

“The ATO is collecting bulk records data from Australian crypto exchanges and comparing it to amounts entered on previous tax returns. Failure to declare crypto gains can attract a penalty of 75% of the outstanding tax liability.”

Binance is also increasing its educational efforts down under by hosting an end of financial year tax masterclass in collaboration with Koinly on July 22.

Sam Teoh, of Binance Australia, stated that the crypto community has voiced their concern around tax compliance, adding “with approximately one in six Australians investing in crypto, taxpayers and tax agents alike are on a steep learning curve.”

Australians are not the only ones coming under the watchful eye of the taxman. In late May, the U.S. Treasury proposed crypto transactions over $10,000 be reported to the Internal Revenue Service.

Meitu loses $17.3M on Bitcoin, gains $14.7M on Ether

July 8, 2021 Coin Telegraph

Bitcoin

Meitu has reported losses of $17.3 million on its Bitcoin holdings, with its Ether investment having gained $14.7 million despite the recent crypto downturn.

Hong Kong tech company Meitu has taken a $17.3 million hit on its Bitcoin (BTC) holdings — but on the upside, its Ether (ETH) holdings have gained $14.7 million.

The developer of popular Photoshop-style apps spent a total of $100 million on BTC and ETH between March and April this year, acquiring a total of 940.89 BTC for $49.5 million, and 31,000 ETH for $50.5 million.

According to a June 6 voluntary announcement from Meitu, the fair value of its BTC and ETH holdings is based on the market prices as of June 30, which is the final day of the firm's six-month interim results, in accordance with International Financial Reporting Standards.

As of the end of the second quarter on June 30, Meitu’s BTC holdings represented $32.2 million and its ETH represented $65.2 million, marking an overall $2.6 million decrease from its initial $100 million investment.

The firm accounts crypto-assets as “intangible assets under the cost model” in the interim results, and the BTC loss is expected to be recognized as “impairment loss”, while the ETH gains will not be recognized as “revaluation gain” until such time as it is sold.

The interim results have not changed the firm's bullish sentiments towards crypto, with the announcement reiterating:

“The Board believes that the blockchain industry is still in its early stage and that cryptocurrencies have ample room for appreciation in value over the long-term.”

The report stated that due to the firm's long-term view “there are currently no plans to sell the same in the near future.”

Interestingly, the firm also provided an updated fair value of its ETH and BTC holdings as of July 6, which reveals an overall $5.2 million gain on its initial investment, with ETH representing $72.4 million, and BTC up slightly to $32.8 million.

Ethereum could gain even more if popular Crypto Twitter account “CroissantEth” is right with his thread containing 24 reasons why ETH is undervalued.

24 reasons $ETH is extremely undervalued...

A thread by
— croissant (@CroissantEth) July 7, 2021

Aside from the obvious use cases of ETH in smart contracts, decentralized finance and NFTs, and the upcoming EIP-1159 upgrade and eventual transition to ETH 2.0, Croissant highlighted the fact that 94 out of the top 100 decentralized apps are built on the Ethereum network.

“These protocols often have many further use cases involving $ETH, creating the fundamentals for the Web 3.0 economy,” he said.

Croissant also points to the stablecoins that utilize the Ethereum network, citing Tether (USDT), USD Coin (USDC), MakerDao (DAI), and TrueUSD (TUSD), as he emphasized their multi-billion market caps, and highlighted that USDC grew from a $4 billion market cap to $25 billion this year.

2. Stablecoins$ETH is home to many stablecoins which have grown tremendous use cases:$USDT: $62B$USDC: $25B$DAI: $5B$TUSD: $1.5B

They are very popular for use in DeFi, & VISA will soon accept tx settlement in $USDC $USDC has grown from a $4B mcap, to $25B this year pic.twitter.com/fP8gufNeAd
— croissant (@CroissantEth) July 7, 2021

The Metaverse, gaming, and digital land also get notable mentions as he cites their massive growth potential, along with layer-two solutions, decentralized autonomous organizations to name a few.

Crypto gains