Key facts:
CEO of a local exchange provided details on the plan of the Buenos Aires government
The head of government, Rodríguez Larreta, confirmed that the City will not hoard cryptocurrencies
Paying taxes with bitcoin (BTC) and cryptocurrencies could be a reality in Buenos Aires, the capital of Argentina. The head of the Buenos Aires Government, Horacio Rodríguez Larreta, announced this today, April 26, during the presentation of the “Buenos Aires +” plan.
“Together with leading companies, we are working so that those who wish can pay their taxes with cryptocurrencies,” said the president. He added: “This does not mean that the city is going to have ‘crypto’ in public accounts, but rather that through an agreement with the so-called virtual wallets we are going to add one more payment option to all the ones we already have.”
On the matter, was expressed the Secretary of Innovation and Digital Transformation of the City, Diego Fernández. For him, cryptocurrencies are the future “and all individuals will be able to save and pay as they wish”.
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Fernández, in statements to the local press, manifested that cryptocurrencies are “innovation, freedom and opportunity”. He detailed, in relation to the new measures that will be implemented, that “the idea is to receive payments in pesos. It is the platforms that are going to implement the changes from cryptocurrencies to pesos.”
It will be for users of cryptocurrency exchanges
It is known that the Government of the Argentine capital is working, among other companies, with the cryptocurrency brokers Bitso, SatoshiTango and Belo.
CriptoNoticias spoke with Manuel Beaudroit, founder and CEO of Belo, who released more details about this initiative. The businessman confirms that in order to pay taxes with cryptocurrencies it will be necessary to have an account in one of the attached exchange platforms.
“The payment, in truth, is for the players that today have cryptocurrencies”, explains Beaudroit and adds: “it is not that the government is going to receive cryptocurrencies, but that it is through cryptocurrency platforms that users are going to be able to pay taxes and, therefore, it is necessary to have an account on those platforms.
The CEO of Belo comments that, for him, “it would be interesting in the future” if the government received cryptocurrencies, but he explains that that would require them to have their own custody system, so it would be “a little more complex.”
Digital identity on blockchains
In addition to paying taxes with bitcoin and cryptocurrencies, as part of the measures of the “Buenos Aires +” plan, the self-sovereign digital identity.
In the words of the head of government, “through an application, people will have the possibility of digitally authenticating their identity, and that will allow them to have access to all the information in one place, their phone.”
This information includes documents such as birth certificates and other civil registry certificates, as well as vaccination certificates.
“All this flow of information, which is going to increase exponentially, is going to be protected by blockchain technology. (…) We are going to be pioneers in the use of this technology so that the users themselves control their data».
Horacio Rodríguez Larreta, head of Government of the City of Buenos Aires.
People are saying…
Rodríguez Larreta’s announcements caused conflicting opinions among Argentines. Many used social networks to express his position.
Lawyer Martín Litwak, author of ‘Tax havens and tax hells’‘among other books, ensures that it seems to him “a good measure that governments adopt an innovative attitude in the matter of taxes”. However, he adds that It would be good if “the priority is to reduce or remove them, and not look for more ways to pay them”.
The journalist and programmer Maximiliano Firtman he asked himself: «Political act to attract voters from another force or something useful for a city-province state?».
In it Facebook group Bitcoin Argentina, some comments that could be read were: “I would pay taxes with pesos”; or “I prefer to pay with Argentine pesos [sic]lifetime”.
Gresham’s law was exemplified in these publications. This principle of economics indicates that, when more than one type of currency circulates in a country, the inhabitants prefer to save in the good currency and not use it as a means of payment.
The truth is that an initiative like the one presented by the Buenos Aires government could be useful for those who have their economy “bitcoinized” and even receive payments in that or other cryptocurrencies. In this way, the passage to Argentine pesos would be made automatically and only at the time of making the payment (as is currently the case with the debit cards offered by some Argentine brokers, for the payment of products and services).