The Blockchain Association (BA) released a tax proposal, which was shared with the US Congress. The BA’s main theme on the proposal was to treat digital assets like cash.
Analysts stated that although regulators treat digital assets as payment instruments, tax law views them as speculative property. In that vein, real economic gain should be taxed, not technical movement; otherwise, he says, compliance friction will overwhelm adoption.
The core principle behind digital asset taxation should be simple: tax real economic gain, not technical movement. Policy needs to follow economic substance and functional use; otherwise, compliance friction overwhelms adoption.
Lavneet Bansal, Crypto Analyst
Regulators treat digital asset as payment instruments
He further stated that stablecoins are a clear example; regulators are increasingly recognizing them as payment instruments under emerging frameworks, yet tax law still treats them as speculative property.
However, if every everyday stablecoin transaction triggers a taxable event, we’re effectively taxing money like an investment asset. Tax rules need to evolve in sync with stablecoin regulation, or we risk structurally undermining the very use case policymakers say they want to support, stated Bansal.
Staking and minting will not be taxed
According to the Blockchain Association’s press release, small transactions of digital assets will be exempted from tax on the grounds that stablecoins are treated as cash.
Furthermore, for functional consistency, the proposal activities like staking and mining will be treated as a similar activity as mentioned above, upon ‘treating rewards as self-created property that is taxable upon disposition and sourced to the token owner’s residence.’
In the European Union, DAC8, the Directive on Administrative Cooperation (tax transparency for crypto-assets), requires that the companies offering crypto-related services disclose information to the regulatory body.
The DAC8, which was effective on January 1, 2026, was formulated to ‘fight tax fraud and combat tax evasion and tax avoidance by enlarging its scope to cover crypto-assets,’ read the report from the European Commission.
