Congress proposes removal of widely used Bitcoin tax loophole and giving it to regulated stablecoins

Congress has introduced the Digital Asset PARITY Act, a bipartisan discussion draft introduced by Reps. Steven Horsford and Max Miller, who would rewrite Section 1091 to cover “specified assets.”

The category explicitly includes actively traded digital assets and their derivatives, and carves out a narrow class of regulated payment stablecoins from routine gain-or-loss recognition.

The draft lands harder on the crackdown side than on the relief side, and that asymmetry is what gives the proposal its sharpest edge.

For years, crypto traders have exploited a gap that stock investors cannot touch. Under current law, wash-sale rules apply to “stock or securities,” a definition that excludes digital assets.

A trader could sell Bitcoin at a loss, buy back in the next day, and still claim the tax deduction, a maneuver the IRS explicitly bars in equity markets.

The PARITY Act draft closes that gap by rewriting Section 1091 to cover actively traded digital assets, notional principal contracts tied to them, and related derivatives, including options, forward contracts, futures contracts, and short positions.

The familiar 30-day-before-and-after replacement window applies, and the wash-sale changes take effect upon enactment.

The stablecoin carveout

On the other side of the ledger, the draft says sellers recognize no gain or loss on the sale of a “Regulated Payment Stablecoin,” provided the transaction stays within a $0.99-$1.01 per-unit band.

When the exception applies, the taxpayer’s basis in the stablecoin is deemed to be $1.00 per unit for calculating any residual gain or loss.

The carveout does not extend to brokers or dealers in securities or commodities, and related-party transactions carry explicit anti-abuse flags, though those guardrails sit under technical drafting review.

A stablecoin must be a payment stablecoin under the GENIUS framework, a permitted issuer must issue it, it must peg solely to the US dollar, it must trade within 1% of $1.00 on at least 95% of trading days in the preceding 12 months, and the taxpayer must acquire it within 1% of $1.00.

The stablecoin section takes effect for taxable years beginning after Dec. 31, 2025, and the draft’s explanatory notes say that Congress is still working on whether to include a $200-per-transaction threshold and an aggregate annual limit in the final text.

That internal candor separates the stablecoin side from the wash-sale side, making the latter read like policy Congress has already decided.

The stablecoin carveout reflects the policy Congress wants, with Congress expecting Treasury to supply anti-abuse rules for coordinated arrangements but not yet embedding those guardrails in the black-letter text.

The policy design

Congress is using the tax code to distinguish between “crypto as payment” and “crypto as trading.”

The stablecoin market now sits at roughly $316 billion, with transaction volume exceeding $34 trillion last year, and a Wharton/WEF analysis found that roughly 99% of stablecoin activity still involves digital asset trading rather than payments.

Congress is offering tax relief to the use case it wants to encourage, and writing new costs into the one it wants to constrain.

The wash-sale rule does not apply where the taxpayer applies mark-to-market accounting to the specified asset, and the draft separately creates a mark-to-market election for dealers and traders in digital assets.

The political loser, more specifically, is the ordinary taxpayer using spot crypto for tax-loss harvesting.

Sophisticated trading businesses may access a cleaner elections framework than the current law provides.

The IRS finalized broker reporting rules for digital asset sales, requiring Form 1099-DA for transactions from Jan. 1, 2025, onward, with brokers furnishing taxpayer copies by Feb. 17, 2026.

Most 2025 statements will not include cost basis, leaving taxpayers to calculate it themselves. This means Congress is debating anti-abuse reform at the exact moment retail crypto holders are experiencing standardized reporting for the first time.

CryptoSlate Daily Brief

Daily signals, zero noise.

Market-moving headlines and context delivered every morning in one tight read.

5-minute digest 100k+ readers

Email address

Get the brief

Free. No spam. Unsubscribe any time.

Whoops, looks like there was a problem. Please try again.

You’re subscribed. Welcome aboard.

The policy direction also reflects a broader consensus that predates the draft. The 2025 White House digital assets report recommended extending wash-sale rules to digital assets, while explicitly stating that those rules should not apply to payment stablecoins.

The 2025 Joint Committee on Taxation report identified the current wash-sale gap and the absence of any de minimis rule for routine digital asset spending.

The PARITY Act is Congress trying to codify a split that tax policy had already mapped.

The same onshore-policy push is also reshaping regulated prediction markets in the U.S.

Where it lands

In an optimistic outcome, lawmakers finalize the stablecoin language cleanly, align it closely with GENIUS definitions, and pair the wash-sale crackdown with a clear $ 200-per-transaction threshold that makes small payments genuinely friction-free.

In that outcome, the tax code accelerates the adoption of on-chain regulated dollars. Visa data show that more than 99% of the stablecoin supply is dollar-denominated, and leading issuers earned more than $7 billion in reserve interest.

If the OCC’s projected issuer base under GENIUS fills out, the carveout covers a material share of dollar stablecoin volume. Crypto gains a cleaner payment rail and a more level trading framework at the same time.

For the worst-case scenario, the wash-sale, short-sale, and derivative coverage survive with little dilution while the stablecoin section stalls in technical review, never reaching a final clean text before the legislative calendar tightens.

The mark-to-market election benefits professionals who can navigate an elections framework, and retail investors lose the loophole fastest, with no offsetting simplification on the payments side.

The broader crypto legislation had hit a new impasse, with banks and crypto firms still fighting over stablecoin economics.

The PARITY Act, as a discussion draft with multiple sections explicitly flagged for ongoing technical work, sits directly inside that gridlock. Taxpayers enter the 2026 filing season under new 1099-DA reporting obligations, with Congress pointing toward reform without yet enacting it.

Congress is more certain about closing the loophole than about the final contours of the stablecoin carveout.

The wash-sale rewrite is the harder edge of the draft, as it is concrete, broadly scoped, and ready to move. The stablecoin relief is the softer edge, presenting itself as directionally clear, mechanically unfinished, and dependent on a regulated-issuer framework that the OCC is still building out.

The version of the bill that actually reaches a vote will reveal which coalition Congress found less uncomfortable to disappoint.

Mentioned in this article

Bitcoin Visa

Posted in

Featured US Regulation Stablecoins Taxes

Context

Related coverage

Switch categories to dive deeper or gain broader context.

US Local News      Taxes Top Category      Press Releases Newswire  

Mining

US moves to break China’s grip on Bitcoin mining hardware with new Senate bill

The bill links mining hardware supply to national security, raising questions about how the US sustains its global hash rate lead.

1 day ago

Analysis

Bitcoin, stocks rally because of chatter that Iran is ready to ‘end the war’ as Dollar Index sinks below 100

Bitcoin’s bounce back above $68,000 hinges on hopes for Middle East peace amid fluctuating oil prices.

1 day ago

CLARITY Act deadline in weeks could kill stablecoin earnings and push money into Bitcoin

Regulation · 1 day ago

Bitcoin treasury trade faces a new test after Nakamoto sold $20M at a loss

Digital Asset Treasuries · 1 day ago

The IRS may see your crypto sale before you can prove what you actually owe

Taxes · 1 day ago

Bitcoin climbed before Wall Street after Iran speaker’s market warning

Macro · 2 days ago

Payments

Congress is making digital dollars easier to use than Bitcoin

Washington’s stablecoin push could make Bitcoin look more like a savings asset than a payments tool.

2 days ago

Taxes

Refusing new IRS crypto tax forms could cost you your exchange account

The IRS would let exchanges bundle electronic delivery consent into onboarding and potentially terminate accounts that refuse.

4 weeks ago

New IRS crypto tax form shows what you sold for (not what you paid) and one-click filing could make you overpay

Taxes · 1 month ago

EU crypto reporting goes live and Netherlands immediately votes on 36% Bitcoin tax – even if you don’t sell

Regulation · 1 month ago

Insiders sell government crypto database to violent home invaders as transparency laws backfire

Crime · 3 months ago

Exchanges to freeze trading and withdrawals after countdown under new crypto law – how long do you have?

Exchanges · 3 months ago

Encrypt Is Coming to Solana to Power Encrypted Capital Markets

Encrypt leverages fully homomorphic encryption to bring encrypted financial applications to Solana’s public blockchain.

1 day ago

Ika Is Coming to Solana to Power Bridgeless Capital Markets

Ika introduces dWallets to Solana, enabling assets from all networks to be managed without bridges.

1 day ago

TxFlow L1 Mainnet Launch Marks a New Phase for Multi-Application On-Chain Finance

PR · 1 day ago

BYDFi Marks 6th Anniversary with Month-Long Celebration, Built for Reliability

PR · 1 day ago

Pendle joins Vietnam IFC delegation alongside BlackRock, Morgan Stanley, and Deutsche Bank

PR · 2 days ago

The Perp Dex That Processed $360 Billion Just Went Live on Crypto’s Most Experimental Blockchain

PR · 2 days ago

Disclaimer

Our writers’ opinions are solely their own and do not reflect the opinion of CryptoSlate. None of the information you read on CryptoSlate should be taken as investment advice, nor does CryptoSlate endorse any project that may be mentioned or linked to in this article. Buying and trading cryptocurrencies should be considered a high-risk activity. Please do your own due diligence before taking any action related to content within this article. Finally, CryptoSlate takes no responsibility should you lose money trading cryptocurrencies. For more information, see our company disclaimers.