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A one-month old circular from Swedish Tax Authority Skatteverket on how to declare income from Bitcoin mining business was emerged recently.
The circular was originally released on April 24th 2015, right before the May 4th tax filling deadline, but went highly unnoticed. It was only when the US Library of Congress intervened, and published a reworded document of the circular on its website, the new Swedish law came to light.
And as it looks, Skatteverket deeply understood the complexities of a Bitcoin mining business before it penned down the income tax guidelines for it. It has traditionally divided the income into the three different categories — income from economic activity, hobby (employment) and capital. Considering the scale of investments required to start a full-fledged Bitcoin mining business, the tax authority has decided to wait for them to earn a surplus, before tagging it as a economic activity income business. Excerpt:
“If the person mining the Bitcoins (or other digital currency) carries out the mining in a professional and cost efficient manner over a longer period with appropriate equipment; or if the activity is expected to create a surplus as measured over the full financial calculation period; and the computing capacity can be expected to generate more than 25 bitcoins a year (or the equivalent value in form of transactional fees or other virtual currency), it can be considered economic activity.”
However, persons involved in Bitcoin mining as a part of hobby are liable to be put under the “income by employment” category. Here, an individual is given a five-year exemption from paying taxes, only prior the year he/she starts generating a surplus. No VAT will be applicable on either of the income categories.
Meanwhile, Bitcoin trading will continue to be tagged under the “income by capital” law.
