It’s Crypto-Tuesday and there a number of big stories in Cryptocurrency News. First, El Salvador is continuing their push to move to the front of Bitcoin economy. You may remember that in September 2021 El Salvador became the first country to declare Bitcoin as it’s national currency. Since then they have taken measures to lead the world in assisting Crypto investors.

The latest move is an announcement that El Salvador is building a Bitcoin City. The City will be built at the foot of Conchagua Volcano. The volcano will help El Salvador Mine Bitcoin with green geothermal energy. Overcoming a common complaint that Bitcoin mining uses too much carbon based energy.

The IRS Criminal Investigations unit has seized $3.5 Billion in Cryptocurrency this year and expects to seize a similar sum next year. What is driving those seizures?

Finally, Hillary Clinton fears Cryptocurrency will destabilize country’s and the American Dollar as the reserve currency. Everyone is interested in Hillary’s Crypto Opinion!

Attorney Steven A. Leahy discussed these important stories on this week’s Crypto-Tuesday episode.

The Build Back Better Act (BBB) sets aside $80 Billion For the IRS. With that increase, the IRS plans on hiring 87.000 new IRS workers to target “wealthy” taxpayers.

However, as Elon Musk points out, there are only 614 billionaires in America. And, “[t]he IRS already has dedicated audit teams for high net worth individuals. The doubling of staff is for everyone else,” Musk warned,

The Administration has already told us not to pay attention to the warned Congressional Budget Office’s analysis – “The CBO has previously underestimated the revenues that increased enforcement would raise.”

Attorney Steven A. Leahy opines on these important issues on Today’s Tax Talk.

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The IRS announced new policies for the Offer In Compromise program. on a recent blog post titled “IRS Initiates New Favorable Offer In Compromise Policies” The National Taxpayer Advocate announced that the offer in compromise refund recoupment process will no longer be applicable for tax periods included on the Form 656.

And second, while refunds may still be offset during the time an OIC is pending, the IRS agrees that taxpayers may seek an OBR during this period.

What does this mean to the average taxpayer in collection? Absolutely nothing. The cold hard facts are – almost no taxpayer gets an Offer in Compromise as a way to settle their IRS Collection Case.

In 2020, the last year statistics are available, the IRS settled 7.4 million IRS Collection Cases. Of those settled cases, only 14,288 offers were accepted. That’s right – less than 1/4 of 1% are settled with an Offer in Compromise. And the second change – the offset bypass refund for pending offers – is only available to those “qualifying taxpayers experiencing financial hardship.”

Last March Congress passed the American Rescue Plan with much fanfare. The Bill was so urgent, there was little debate. What has come to light is the new 1099-K reporting requirements for those that use cash apps like Venmo, Paypal, Cash App, and Zelle.

The old reporting rule required cash apps to report users with $20,000.00 or more in value AND at least 200 transactions. The new rule requires cash apps to report users with at least $600 in transactions, no matter how many transactions are involved. This is a monumental change to the law.

The Administration promises users will only be taxed on commercial transactions – but the onus will be on the taxpayer to prove which transaction are personal and which are commercial.

Attorney Steven A. Leahy talks about what to expect when these new rules are implemented.