The Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore (IRAS) has reportedly made amendments to tax guidance focusing on digital tokens, covering payment, utility, security and ICO-generated tokens.

Specifically, miners, ICO issuers, businesses, and individuals will receive a tax exemption, should fluctuations occur which cannot be recognized.

While highlighting that payment tokens are not treated as legal tenders, Singapore’s new guidelines revealed that all finalized, payment tokens-enabled transactions “are viewed as barter trade.”

Upon receiving payment tokens, the companies will fulfill their tax duties, with the amount being deprived of the value of sold merchandise, and usual deductions apply for firms that utilize payment tokens as a payment option for its goods and services.

Per the guideline, while payments made using utility tokens do not have a high chance of “creating an income subject to tax”, utility tokens may “give rise to a deductible expense subject to usual deduction rules”.

The guidelines clearly stated that the determined amount to be taxed, for rewards generated via executing ICOs, will be decided upon the fact if they are presented as remuneration for services provided.

The tax amount for security tokens will be determined accordingly to “the nature of the return derived from a security token”, particularly “whether it is in the form of interest or dividend, or the security token is a capital or revenue asset to the owner.”

“Miners may perform mining as a hobby or to hold the tokens mined as a long-term investment. If so, the disposal gains/ losses of the payment tokens are not taxable/ deductible.” The guideline further read.