Why higher capital gains taxes in the US might be bad news for bitcoin

US president Joe Biden wants to significantly increase capital gains tax. That will have a knock-on effect on the markets, says John Stepek. And on bitcoin and crypto in particular. Here’s why.

Bitcoin and US dollars
A tax increase could put a cap on the crypto-frenzy
(Image credit: © Nicolas Economou/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

US investors got a nasty tax shock yesterday: US president Joe Biden wants to increase capital gains tax. A lot.

He’ll be laying out the exact details next week. But suffice to say, if you’re an investor in America, sitting on a lot of paper profits, you might now be wondering if it’s time to take some money off the table.

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John Stepek

John Stepek is a senior reporter at Bloomberg News and a former editor of MoneyWeek magazine. He graduated from Strathclyde University with a degree in psychology in 1996 and has always been fascinated by the gap between the way the market works in theory and the way it works in practice, and by how our deep-rooted instincts work against our best interests as investors.

He started out in journalism by writing articles about the specific business challenges facing family firms. In 2003, he took a job on the finance desk of Teletext, where he spent two years covering the markets and breaking financial news.

His work has been published in Families in Business, Shares magazine, Spear's Magazine, The Sunday Times, and The Spectator among others. He has also appeared as an expert commentator on BBC Radio 4's Today programme, BBC Radio Scotland, Newsnight, Daily Politics and Bloomberg. His first book, on contrarian investing, The Sceptical Investor, was released in March 2019. You can follow John on Twitter at @john_stepek.