protos.com
Thousands of crypto traders have apparently been sucked in by yet another fake news report about US presidential candidate Kamala Harris. This time, they thought she endorsed a new tax on unrealized gains that would affect millions of crypto investors.
Misreading little more than a headline from news snippet accounts like WallStreetBets or WatcherGuru, incensed readers decried the US presidential candidate supposedly wanting to tax unrealized capital gains at 44.6%.
Somehow, they believed, Harris wants to force crypto holders to sell off roughly half of their portfolio and mail the proceeds straight to the IRS.
However, exactly like the ‘news’ about Harris from the day prior, this never happened.
Read more: German government told ‘taxes are robbery’ via Bitcoin inscription
Fake Kamala Harris news came from a month-old tax plan
Harris didn’t endorse any new unrealized gains tax yesterday. Instead, as a way to engagement-farm the ongoing Democratic National Convention on social media, crypto commenters rebroadcast old material about Democrat policy documents.
Most commenters simply blurted, “Kamala Harris has endorsed a tax on unrealized capital gains.” It would, in their mistaken view, tax someone who held a single bitcoin acquired at any lower price.
The actual truth is that a Democratic platform document, crafted over a month ago, includes a proposed 25% ‘billionaire tax’ that might apply, if enacted, to the income and unrealized capital gains of wealthy tax filers who own more than $100 million worth of assets.
That is the so-called news — a month-old tax plan that might apply, if approved, to less than 0.004% of the US population. (There are currently fewer than 12,000 centimillionaire US residents.)