That stablecoins are exempt from transaction tax is not entirely true. 👉

I often now come across the view of some advisers that by using stablecoins for payments, the taxpayer will be exempt from transaction tax. Beware, this is not true in many cases !

Example:

📌 The SK company uses the services of an escrow provider;
📌 The SK company pays the invoice to the supplier by transferring stablecoins via this provider.

However (simplified):

👉 Every EMT is a stablecoin (Art. 3, para. 1(7)) MiCA);
👉 Every EMT is electronic money (Art. 48(2) MiCA);
👉 Every provider wallet allowing EMT transfers is a payment account (Art. 48, pt. 12 PSD2);
👉 Every electronic money is a financial instrument (Art. 4, pt. 25 PSD2);

Thus, if an SK company pays an invoice via EMT through a Binance wallet, not only is this transaction subject to transaction tax, but the SK company must calculate the tax itself (§ 10(4)), remit it and keep records of it (§ 11).

Fingers crossed…

It unmasks three things:

✅ This is not a legal solution to avoid transaction tax – I described some tips for legally avoiding transaction tax here: https://lnkd.in/eR3E_yBK
✅ The legislator “has no idea” (I wrote more floridly on this systemic problem here: https://lnkd.in/enxwdW8e)
✅ More comprehensive tax advice needs to be done hand in hand with the legal one, otherwise it is half-hearted;

Highgate Law & Tax

P.S. Thursday we have a conference on buying and selling Slovak companies. We will also talk about the impact of the current social events (which also includes the competence crisis (not only in the creation of laws)) on the valuation of Slovak companies and the demand for them.

Over 200 people will be there – entrepreneurs, investors and various advisors. Feel free to drop me a line if you’d like to come and didn’t get a ticket. We’ll see what we can do.