The IRS is weighing different approaches to crypto taxation, says Treasury official

The U.S. Internal Revenue Service is assessing different approaches to rules on cryptocurrency taxation, a government official said during an event on Thursday.

Erika Nijenhuis, who serves as senior counsel for the Treasury Department's Office of Tax Policy, said during a blockchain-focused OECD event that “[t]here are trade-offs among all of them and we are hard at work thinking about all of those issues," referring to the varying elements that factor into what will ultimately constitute tax rules for cryptocurrencies. Nijenhuis' comments were reported by Bloomberg Law.

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Nijenhuis also focused on "the burden each approach puts on cryptocurrency parties, like exchanges, and the range of benefits, like enhancing compliance, each approach provides," per the report. 

Calls for greater clarity from the agency have persisted for some time, and those demands were on display during a crypto tax summit hosted by the IRS last March. The IRS has been expanding its pool of resources to pursue and investigate crypto tax issues, and the expected tax rules form part of that broader process. 

Virtual currency issues were included on the Service's 2020-2021 Priority Guidance Plan.

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