content: Why is Crypto trading supposedly anonymous, yet it is taxed? Most Cryptocurrency traders use Coinbase, there you can buy Bitcoin and trade other cryptocurrencies. People are trying to trade for a profit using these currencies just like they would with any real world currency, and for some it is working. HOWEVER, for each crypto currency traded for ANOTHER cryptocurrency, this apparently has a Captial Gains Tax attached to it and should be listed in your tax return. In other words, EVERY SINGLE cryptocurrency transaction you make is legally visible, or required to be disclosed to the authorities, and then you have to pay for that (assuming you yielded a net positive on your returns). This has burnt a lot of people who are 100's of grands in debt after years of accumulated trading, only to have a rude awakening when coinbase INC. sends them a tax 1099-K sheet, see example: https://www.reddit.com/r/tax/comments/9tcnu8/did_i_ruin_my_life_by_trading_crypto/ The promises of Cryptocurrencies were this: 1. Freedom of trading, i.e. completely unregulated by authorities, you can buy  and sell with whoever you want and without a THIRD PARTY 2. Anonymity, Bitcoin and other cryptos transactions were supposed to be completely anonymous and impossible to track. So my quesiton, in light of this is why are crypto transactions being identified by the authorities, even between cryptos without fiat involved, and then taxed, when cryptocurrency transactions were supposed to be anonymous, doesn't this violate the whole point of cryptos? The only positive I see with cryptos is that they cannot be continuously created out of thin air like fiat, thus trading a bit like "gold", but this is untrue, the founders of BTC obviously pre-mined the crypto massively and a few persons own over 80% of the entire crypto reserve, enabling them to manipulate market prices heavily via volatility, thus other crypto users are at the mercy of these so called whales, which inflate or deflate the value of BTC at will.