{"id":35797,"date":"2021-02-03T15:06:07","date_gmt":"2021-02-03T13:06:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/?p=35797"},"modified":"2025-08-29T03:02:44","modified_gmt":"2025-08-29T00:02:44","slug":"south-africas-tax-authority-begins-audits-of-cryptocurrency-investors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/south-africas-tax-authority-begins-audits-of-cryptocurrency-investors\/","title":{"rendered":"South Africa&#8217;s tax authority begins audits of cryptocurrency investors"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The South African Revenue Service (SARS) has begun sending audit requests to taxpayers demanding additional information about digital asset trades, according to <a href=\\\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/finance\/465002\/sars-is-starting-to-audit-cryptocurrency-traders-in-south-africa-heres-what-you-should-know\/\\\" target=\\\"_blank\\\" rel=\\\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\\\">Businesstech<\/a>.<br \/>\n<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Tax Consulting South Africa, a consulting firm, noted that SARS&#8217;s request for additional information is a standard preliminary step in reviewing filed tax returns. But this year the agency additionally required:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>specify the purpose for which the taxpayer acquired cryptocurrency;<\/li>\n<li>provide a letter from the trading platform confirming investments, the relevant trading graphs for the period, and bank statements.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Thomas Lobban, head of the cross-border taxation department at Tax Consulting South Africa, stressed that failing to provide information in response to SARS&#8217;s request or submitting false data constitutes a criminal offence in the country.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>&#8220;This means that a taxpayer who cannot properly disclose their cryptocurrency-related income may be convicted of wrongdoing and face a fine or imprisonment of up to two years,&#8221; he added.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>According to Lobban, many people believe that tax liabilities arise only when funds are withdrawn from an exchange.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>&#8220;Unfortunately, this is not the case. From the outset, one should know that all cryptocurrency transactions will have tax consequences,&#8221; he added.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>In 2018, South African authorities decided to tax profits from all cryptocurrency transactions.<\/p>\n<p>In April last year, the Inter-Governmental FinTech Working Group (IFWG) proposed tightening the regulation of digital assets. Later, the Financial Sector Conduct Authority (FSCA) <a href=\"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/news\/south-africa-to-treat-cryptocurrencies-as-financial-products\">presented a draft regulation<\/a>, according to which Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are treated as financial products.<\/p>\n<p>New proposals for regulating the industry <a href=\"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/news\/cryptocurrencies-to-come-under-regulation-in-south-africa\">presented in January 2021<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Subscribe to Forklog&#8217;s channel on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/channel\/UCC9FnXTC8_ENzaNSO5cHQ6g\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\"> YouTube<\/a>!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The South African Revenue Service (SARS) has begun sending taxpayers audit requests demanding additional information about digital asset trades, according to Businesstech.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":35798,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"select":"1","news_style_id":"1","cryptorium_level":"","_short_excerpt_text":"","creation_source":"","_metatest_mainpost_news_update":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[1839,558],"class_list":["post-35797","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","tag-south-africa","tag-taxes"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"views":"15","promo_type":"1","layout_type":"1","short_excerpt":"","is_update":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35797","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35797"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35797\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":35799,"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35797\/revisions\/35799"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35798"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35797"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35797"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35797"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}