1 Soon to be published in Bundessteuerblatt, the German Federal Tax Gazette; but already available (in German) at the Ministry’s official Web Site – please click here.
2 Cryptocurrency assets are not issued by the central bank or any public body and typically do not have the legal status of a currency or money; however, they are increasingly accepted by persons.
3 IMPORTANT NOTE: Income generated from cryptocurrency assets can be classified as business income, e.g., if block-creating activities are sustainable and/or if cryptocurrency assets are repeatedly bought and sold. This may lead to other tax implications and requires a detailed analysis on an individual basis.
4 At the time of writing, the global market cap amounted to $1.2 trillion; see "Today's Cryptocurrency Prices by Market Cap" at: https://coinmarketcap.com/ . (By clicking on this link, you are leaving the KPMG website for an external site, that KPMG is not affiliated with nor is it endorsed by KPMG. The use of the external site and its content may be subject to the terms of use and/or privacy policies of its owner or operator.)
5 Meanwhile, El Salvador and the Central African Republic have adopted Bitcoin as a legal currency.
6 Note that there is a case pending with the German Federal Fiscal Court under file number IX R 3/22; the lower court ruled that cryptocurrencies are regarded as assets for tax purposes.
7 As opposed to investment income (e.g., dividends, interests, sale of shares/securities) which is subject to a flat tax of 25% plus solidarity surcharge of 5.5% and church tax (where applicable).
8 Derived from Latin phrase in the Bible: “fiat lux!”, meaning that the creation of (fiat) money is not backed or tied to the amount of gold that a government owns and is therefore regarded at risk from inflation.
9 The tax exemption limit of €600 also includes the sale of other taxable assets (e.g., precious metals or properties) and is not only granted for cryptocurrencies.
10 Crypto-related ETNs can be bought and traded via an ordinary stock exchange/broker. Hence, the advantage from a practical point of view is that investors can benefit from the asset’s price development and neither a crypto exchange registration nor a crypto wallet is required. On the other hand, the issuer of the crypto-based ETN charges administration fees.
11 So called "Xetra-Gold-Inhaberschuldverschreibung.“
12 E.g., Block rewards and transaction fees.
13 See footnote 6.
14 See "Bundesministerium der Finanzen veröffentlicht BMF-Schreiben zur Ertragsbesteuerung von virtuellen Währungen und sonstigen Token," Press release (in German) at the Ministry’s official website (please click here).