UK Introduces Separate Category For Crypto In Tax Return Forms

As part of its move to implement broad crypto regulation, the United Kingdom has revealed a new strategy to classify digital assets during tax filings. Accordingly, His Majesty’s Treasury will feature a separate category for crypto assets in the country’s revamped tax forms.

Amendment To Crypto Tax Forms

The UK Treasury released the published report for the country’s national budget for Spring 2023, showing an amendment to the self-assessment forms for digital assets. Based on the table of anticipated costs and budget revenue, the content on crypto assets only appears from page number 2025-26.

This implies that British citizens must declare their first-time crypto holdings for the tax year 2024-25. Meanwhile, the Treasury does not have the exact numbers of anticipated revenues from the budget in this category.

Hence, the numbers depicted in the table stand at 10 million GBP. Meanwhile, the Chartered Institute of Taxation (CIOT) has commended the recent tax changes for crypto assets.

As the leading professional body that assesses national tax policies in the UK, CIOT has thrown its support for the initiative. According to CIOT deputy president, Gary Ashford, declaring crypto transactions in tax returns would help raise awareness of people’s obligations towards tax.

Ashford calls for more efforts to counter the widespread ignorance associated with tax payment and the requirements for crypto as an emerging financial tool. According to him, low-income crypto investors have the least knowledge of tax reporting.

At the start of the month, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) reportedly notified Treasury that it is working on an ambitious market reset as the Financial Services and Markets bill awaits the parliament’s final vote. When approved, the bill would empower the FCA with regulatory powers over the crypto market.

Crackdown Against Unregistered Crypto ATMs Continues

Earlier in the month, the FCA announced that it had started a cracked down on unregistered crypto ATMs in London in a joint operation with the Metropolitan Police. According to FCA’s deputy director of enforcement and market oversight, Mark Steward, the operation of unregistered crypto ATMs is illegal.

He added that the ongoing operations are a clear message to the actors and that the agency will continue to identify and shut down illegal crypto activities in the UK.

Steward noted that the FCA has yet to regulate crypto products fully, but they are high-risk assets and can cause investors to lose their funds. The FCA is one of the global financial watchdogs with the most stringent requirements for crypto trading platforms.

As a result, several crypto exchanges that have applied for registration with the regulator were declined as only a few met its demanding requirements.