TAR Lazio cryptocurrencies
The Lazio Regional Administrative Court (TAR) rules on the taxation of cryptocurrencies.
With ruling no. 01077/2019, published on January 27, 2020, the administrative judges ruled on the challenge to the Revenue Agency's provisions (specifically, the instructions for completing the tax return) requiring virtual currencies to be reported in the RW section.
The ruling first specifies that the documents approving the instructions for completing the 2019 Single Personal Tax Return Form, indicating that virtual currencies should be included in the RW section among foreign financial income, do not constitute the corresponding tax obligation, but merely acknowledge existing reporting obligations, as defined pursuant to Articles 1 and 4 of Legislative Decree No. 167 of 1990, converted into Law No. 227 of 1990 (amended by Legislative Decree No. 90 of 2017) and within the relevant limits; as such, they are not harmful and therefore cannot be challenged.
In this sense, the judges considered the fact that the amendment to Legislative Decree 167/1990 implemented through Legislative Decree 90/2017 explicitly included the use of "virtual currencies" among the transactions relating to transfers to and from abroad, relevant for the purposes of the related monitoring pursuant to art. 1 of Legislative Decree 167/1990, to be decisive.
Furthermore, after examining the doctrine and the attitude adopted by other countries, the Lazio Regional Administrative Court (TAR) intended to adopt a qualification based on a "functional" definition of the object (i.e. teleological and not merely typological), which requires that the relevant (existing) forms of taxation include not the mere possession of virtual currencies as such, but rather their use and utilization within the range of different possible operations, consistently with their actual nature, which is - precisely - "representative of values" (even if arising from a contractual and voluntary recognition of the subjects who use them), which, in turn, are constituted by economic and legal utilities as such assessable and pertinent to the assets of the owner, therefore expressive of taxable capacity.
TAR Lazio cryptocurrencies
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