ALBAWABA - The Justice Department has charged Roger Ver, a renowned bitcoin investor who rose to fame as "Bitcoin Jesus" due to his early investment in the digital currency which made him a fortune, with $48 million in tax fraud.
Roger Ver, dubbed as "Bitcoin Jesus" due to how he worked as an advocate for the cryptocurrency, is one of the early investors in Bitcoin, making a whopping $179 million after 8 years of purchasing $25,000 worth of coins. Known for being a very outspoken figure and controversial investors in cryptocurrencies, due to his views and multiple run-ins with government authorities.
Ver dismissed his US citizenship in 2014 after becoming a St. Kitts and Nevis citizen, and when someone renounces their citizenship, according to Yahoo, the assets they own is viewed as being sold for its fair market value on the day before in a "constructive sale," with any earnings from that sale to be reported in that tax year as per federal tax rules.
Ver and two firms he controlled, MemoryDealers.com and Agilestar.com, possessed around 131,000 bitcoins on the day he became a St. Kitts and Nevis citizen, with each trading for around $871 at the time, putting them at more than $114 million in value.
Authorities allege that Ver involved a legal firm to assist him submit his expatriation-related taxes and an assessment to value his firms, but gave them inaccurate or deceptive data about how much bitcoin they really held.
Ver eventually seized custody of the two firms' 70,000 bitcoins and resold them for around $240 million in 2017, according to the indictment. However, authorities alleged he neglected to pay taxes on distributions from those two US entities.
The United States, according to Bloomberg, intends to extradite Ver after being arrested in Spain over tax evasion, mail fraud and filing fake forms to circumvent paying at least $48 million in US taxes.
"Mr. Ver relied on leading tax professionals to help him report his Bitcoin and he always intended to fully comply with his U.S. tax obligations," Ver’s lawyer Bryan Skarlatos said in a statement, adding “We look forward to establishing his innocence in court, if necessary.”
