Accounting Issues Related to Bitcoins

Abstract

Despite the frequent mention of Bitcoin in recent years in the press and business publications, many people are still uncertain what this cryptocurrency is or how it works. And although bitcoins (BTCs) are now an accepted medium of exchange for some businesses and not‐for‐profit organizations, no specific accounting guidance has been issued for these transactions. This article provides some basic information about BTCs and addresses six specific financial accounting issues: asset classification, mining activity, investment holdings, exchanges, merger and acquisition (M&A) transactions, and disclosure.

Tribal Governance: The Business of Blockchain Authentication

“…The Estonian e-residency initiative [36] raises concerns regarding identity authentication and the possible consequences of displacing responsibilities. This is in line with the call for individual accountability [5,6]. Our initial empirical work showed that the interactions between existing authorities and blockchain records are far from settled.…”

“…Copies are not all the same as they used to be. This is fostered by the open nature of the Bitcoin blockchain where no single node can be held accountable due to its distributed nature [5,6]. Traditional jurisdictions thereby may act as a mediating entity in case of disputes only to the extent concerned parties accept it.…”

Accounting for Bitcoin and Other Cryptocurrencies under IFRS: A Comparison and Assessment of Competing Models

“…18 for such a treatment. In accordance with practice-oriented articles (Raiborn and Sivitanides, 2015;Tan and Low, 2017), the paper argues that faithful representation varies with reporting entities and depends on their actual business model along with the economic reality of the underlying transaction. Mining of cryptocurrencies shall, therefore, follow different accounting principles other than receiving payments in cryptocurrencies or investing into cryptocurrencies.…”

Cryptocurrencies: market analysis and perspectives

“…From the accounting perspective, cryptocurrencies are investment assets, sometimes even treated similarly to stocks for accounting purposes(Raiborn and Sivitanides 2015).…”