Quote:
Originally Posted by Vuggie
Seriously? You have to pay tax on your withdrawals (winnings)?
I didn't think it worked that way. I thought you pay the tax as part of the rake and that was it?
On a separate note, even though the rake is very high, I think the games are still quite beatable. Too many fish
A few years ago, it was common knowledge that poker winnings were not to be taxed, as it is a game of chance (in France lottery or casino winnings are not taxed). Mails were sent to our IRS that confirmed this, fiscal lawyers were saying the same, all was good.
When they regulated poker, a new law was written saying explicitly that poker was a game of chance, to enable the gvt to tax every hand or tournament buyins. Now that it was official, it seemed we didn't have to worry about income tax at all. However, many grinders smelled something fishy and went expatriate to london, malta or thailand were they cannot be taxed.
In the end of last year, the IRS launched a wave of fiscal checks to pretty much all known french players, sponsored pros, guys with hendon mob winnings, coaches, etc. Arguing that in the long term, skills limit the chance element, they are asking for taxes on the poker revenues on last 3 or 5 years. The "funny" thing of it is that they are claiming heavy penalty taxes, because those revenues were not declared in time and because it was an "occult" business. So for some guys, they are asking from 80% to 100+% of the winnings. It's completly insane. The procedure is quite lengthy and pretty much all controlled players are fighting with lawyers against it.
Now we fear that a second wave of fiscal checks will be launched against all online grinders, based on the data the regulated instance got from the pokersites.
Those ****ers don't realize they are taxing every players because it is a game of chance, and later tax the winning players because it's a game of skill... great logic.
A few months ago, the gvt officially stated that poker revenues have to be declared, but how to do it is still very vague. It will probably be taxed around 40/50%.