Crypto Groups Urge Congress to Pass Mining and Staking Tax Bill Without Changes

• Three crypto groups urge Congress to pass the H.R. 9175 staking tax bill intact.
• H.R. 9175 delays the tax on mining and staking rewards until the point of sale or death.
• Horsford’s amendment would require taxes on staking and mining rewards every five years.

Three of the crypto industry’s biggest advocacy groups have written to the House Ways and Means Committee, urging lawmakers to pass the Tax Clarity for Mining and Staking Act exactly as introduced, without reopening the compromise text.

The letter, signed by the CEOs of the Crypto Council for Innovation, the Blockchain Association, and the Digital Chamber, was sent on June 21 and directed to Committee Chairman Jason Smith and Ranking Member Richard Neal. It backs H.R. 9175, introduced by Representative Mike Carey, which addresses how mining and staking rewards are taxed.

The Problem the Bill Is Trying to Fix

Since Bitcoin launched in 2009, miners and stakers have operated without clear tax rules on when rewards are taxed, how they are sourced, and what character they carry for tax purposes. The IRS issued guidance in 2014 requiring miners to report the fair market value of mined Bitcoin as income on the day it is received. A 2023 revenue ruling extended the same immediate-taxation logic to staking rewards.

Industry groups and lawmakers have long argued this approach creates serious problems. Taxing rewards the moment they are created forces holders to pay tax on assets they may not be able to sell yet, effectively pushing them into forced selling just to cover a tax bill. The groups describe this as taxation of phantom income.

What H.R. 9175 Does

The bill delays taxation until the point of sale or death, modeled on how the tax code has historically treated newly created property. The groups say it strikes a hard-won balance: income is eventually recognized, but holders are not taxed before they can actually monetize the asset.

The Amendment That Has Industry Worried

Crypto Council for Innovation CEO Ji Kim warned that an amendment proposed by Representative Horsford would break that balance by replacing the bill’s framework with a mandatory five-year recognition cycle, forcing taxpayers to calculate and pay tax on staking and mining rewards every five years, regardless of whether they have sold anything.

“Rep. Horsford’s amendment would unfortunately break H.R. 9175, replacing it with a five-year forced-sale clock on staking and mining rewards that the Joint Committee on Taxation says raises negligible revenue,” Kim said. “There have already been significant concessions made in framing this as an election. We respectfully urge passage of H.R. 9175 as introduced.”

The Joint Committee on Taxation reviewed the proposed amendment and found it would raise minimal additional revenue while imposing significant compliance costs on taxpayers, their advisers, and the IRS, requiring complex cost-basis tracking across potentially millions of wallets without any actual sale taking place.

Why the Groups Say It Must Pass Unchanged

The letter argues that reopening the compromise risks stalling a bipartisan result that is finally within reach. With over $1.7 trillion in assets currently secured through proof-of-work and proof-of-stake mechanisms, the groups say clear tax rules are essential to keeping blockchain validation and the innovation it supports based in the United States.

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