Russian Finance Ministry widens criminal liability for undeclared bitcoins
Owners of digital currencies face up to three years in prison if they fail to report to the tax authorities on operations equivalent to 45 million rubles or more. Such a provision is contained in the new version of amendments by the Russian Finance Ministry to the Criminal and Criminal Procedure Codes, пишет РБК.
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Individuals and organisations must report to the Federal Tax Service on receiving digital currency, transactions with it, and balances in cryptocurrency wallets if the calendar-year value of operations exceeds the equivalent of 600,000 rubles. Previously, the threshold stood at 100,000 rubles.
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The calculation is based on the market price of the digital currency on the date of each operation. The Federal Tax Service should set the rules for determining the market price.
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The initial disclosure of cryptoasset ownership must be made by no later than 30 April 2022.
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Crypto exchanges and miners must submit information about cryptocurrency transactions to Rosfinmonitoring.
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A fine of 50,000 rubles is provided for late reporting. For inaccurate information — a fine of 10% of the larger of the two sums in ruble terms (the amount of cryptocurrency received or the amount of cryptocurrency written off).
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Non-payment or underpayment of tax on income from digital currency operations incurs a fine of 40% of the unpaid tax amount.
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To uphold the general principles of legal regulation, digital currency is recognised as property.
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If crypto asset holders neglected to provide data to the tax authority more than twice within three years or included knowingly false information in their report, this will entail criminal liability:
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- For undeclared transactions involving digital currency totaling 15 million rubles within three years, the fine will be up to 300,000 rubles.
- If transactions over three years total 45 million rubles or more, asset holders face a fine of up to 2 million rubles or imprisonment for up to three years.
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Administrative fines for arranging illicit turnover of digital financial assets (DFA) and for violations of the rules governing crypto-asset transactions:
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- for individuals, up to 500,000 rubles;
- for officials — up to 1 million rubles or disqualification for a period of six months to one year;
- for legal entities — up to 2 million rubles.
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If digital currency was used as a means of payment for goods or services, a fine of up to 200,000 rubles is imposed on individuals, 400,000 rubles on officials, and up to 1 million rubles on legal entities. In all these cases, the digital currency is seized.
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The Finance Ministry also developed amendments to the Tax Code, the anti-money-laundering legislation, and the Administrative Violations Code regarding the regulation of digital currencies and digital financial assets (DFA).
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The documents have been published for public consultation.
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Earlier, the first amendments to the law ‘On DFA’ were presented by the Russian Finance Ministry in early September.
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They prohibit the circulation and issuance of cryptocurrencies, except their transfer by inheritance and collection in bankruptcy and enforcement proceedings. It is not allowed to receive digital currency as a reward for mining.
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In the same month, officials proposed to introduce criminal liability for non-declaration of cryptocurrencies. In the first draft of the document, large-scale transactions began at 5 million rubles, and the issuance and circulation of digital currency bypassing Russia’s information infrastructure was punishable by imprisonment for up to four years.
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