Five Things to Know about New Jersey’s Taxation of Convertible Virtual Currency

On March 10, 2015, the New Jersey Division of Taxation issued Technical Advisory Memorandum TAM-2015-1, explaining its policy regarding convertible virtual currency.¹

The IRS has held that convertible virtual currency (CVC), such as Bitcoin, is treated as property for U.S. federal income tax purposes. Consequently, transactions involving CVC are treated as barter transactions. In general, each party in a barter transaction is viewed as both a buyer (of the goods or services acquired) and a seller (of the goods or services given in exchange). See our client alert of March 26, 2014. New Jersey conforms to the federal treatment of CVC for corporate and personal income tax purposes, including wage withholding and reporting of payments to independent contractors.