Coinsquare quotes between 5 and 10 percent of customer records may be caught in the sweep.
Canada’s tax jurisdiction, the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA), has prevailed in a court struggle for access to a trove of high-value customer data held by cryptocurrency exchange Coinsquare. Along with the CRA seems to be coming to get longer.
Under a federal judge’s March 19 order, Coinsquare must hand over detailed information on its Canadian clients, their crypto trading activity and identifying information to the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA).
Coinsquare told CoinDesk it will disclose data on an estimated 5 percent to 10 percent of its 400,000 customers to the CRA, which had initially sought to secure the lot. Court documents indicate just high-value accounts will probably be caught in the sweep.
The very first of its kind ruling hands CRA a triumph only seven weeks after it started pursuing Coinsquare’s customer information in courtroom. CRA argued it had the data to assess if taxpayers were meeting their crypto reporting burdens as well as the national court agreed.
Today, CoinDesk also learned the tax authority is”currently in the process of serving” Coinsquare with a further request for client information by means of an”Unnamed Persons Requirement” (UPR).
Echoes of Coinbase vs. the IRS
Five years ago, the Internal Revenue Service, CRA’s U.S. counterpart, established a similar attempt against Coinbase, employing a parallel debate for accessibility. Though Coinbase at first lambasted that the IRS’ “fishing trip” it finally acceded into some judge’s order, handing over records on several 13,000 clients .
At the time, Coinbase called the result a”partial victory” since it said it had pared down the scope of the IRS’ needs to include only accounts trading more than C$20,000 (US$15,800).
Coinsquare echoed that sentiment on Tuesday because it touted the pared-down order secured through discussions with CRA as a triumph.
Coinsquare’s final bargain will induce the crypto exchange to deliver at year’s end exhaustive information on accounts which held C$20,000 in crypto from 2014-2020 or cumulatively in their background, in addition to the 16,500 largest accounts from each year.
“Coinsquare made to protect its customers’ privacy, also restrict any disclosure to just what was absolutely needed by the CRA under Canadian tax legislation,” Coinsquare informed CoinDesk.
“Rather than providing the CRA together with customer data dating back to 2013 as was originally asked, Coinsquare and the CRA have consented that information about 90%-95% of Coinsquare’s clients will not be disclosed.”
The CRA spokeswoman said the bureau”reserves the right” to mount future taxpayer information collection efforts against Coinsquare and”other resources ” But she said the pared-down court order”seems sufficient to verify compliance with the ITA or the ETA.”
