The House Ways and Means Committee held a legislative hearing on June 9, where Chairman Jason Smith (R-MO) steered the committee through a review of at least six bills and related drafts aimed at overhauling how the IRS treats digital assets. It was the committee’s first substantial engagement with crypto tax policy in years.
What’s actually in the bills
The draft legislation, released on June 4, tackles several pain points that crypto holders and industry lobbyists have been vocal about for years. Two bills in particular stand out.
H.R. 9178 is designed to reduce the paperwork burden for digital asset owners making small transactions. Under current rules, purchasing something with Bitcoin technically triggers a taxable event, and you’re supposed to report the capital gain or loss. The bill aims to carve out relief for these kinds of everyday uses.
H.R. 9175 addresses deferral options for rewards earned through mining and staking. Right now, when a validator earns staking rewards or a miner receives newly minted tokens, the IRS treats that as taxable income at the moment of receipt. The proposed bill would let recipients defer that tax hit.
