Crypto Council for Innovation Calls for Digital Asset Transaction Tax Exemption

The Crypto Council for Innovation ("CCI") supported a de minimis tax exemption on digital asset transactions to relieve users from the heavy compliance burdens of tracking small, everyday transactions.

In a published open letter, CCI asserted that treating digital assets as property creates disproportionate administrative hurdles for everyday users. CCI said that tracking high-frequency, low-value transactions—such as network gas fees—discourages adoption and creates friction that undermines the tax base. CCI argued that any de minimis exemption must apply uniformly across the entire digital asset ecosystem, including assets like Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana, and stablecoins. CCI emphasized that limiting the exemption only to stablecoins would ignore the practical realities of blockchain networks, where users frequently pay small gas fees using various tokens to facilitate basic network activity.

The Council suggested that the exemption could incorporate strict anti-abuse provisions, such as anti-structuring rules to prevent taxpayers from splitting larger transactions to qualify for the tax relief, ensuring the policy provides meaningful administrative relief similar to the existing $200 exemption for foreign currency transactions. The group also noted that approximately 14% of U.S. adults now own cryptocurrency and that the IRS is anticipating an overwhelming 8 billion individual digital asset reporting forms this year, which would double the amount of all other 1099 filings the agency receives annually.