Study on the Implementation of Transactions with Virtual Currencies in the Fiscal Field

Interest in virtual currencies has gained amplitude in recent years. According to recent estimates, made by a trading platform, the number of cryptocurrency users increased by more than 10 million, globally, between December 2020 and January 2021. Likewise, in Romania, the community of cryptocurrency users is booming, so there are more and more questions about the reporting and taxation obligations of income obtained from virtual currency transactions. Among the most common are those related to the way of declaration, the amount subject to taxation and when the income becomes taxable. In Romania, transactions with virtual currencies were settled for the first time in 2019, by means of Law 30/2019, which introduced into the Fiscal Code provisions regarding the taxation of incomes obtained in this way. According to these regulations, the income from the transfer of virtual currency falls under the category of income from other sources and is subject to the specific tax regime for this category, with certain peculiarities. One of the peculiarities is that the determination of the applicable income tax and social contributions is the responsibility of those who earn the income, not the responsibility of the payers of the income (as is the case with other incomes in the same category). Even for the exchanges made through trading platforms, the reporting obligation remains with the users.