Family Of Five Dubbed “Bitcoin Family” Moves To Portugal Because Of Its No-tax Policy On Bitcoin

We’ve seen a lot of people do crazy things for their beliefs. Since cryptocurrency came on board, we’ve seen enthusiasts, advocates and even extremists. For example, Nayib Bukele, President of El Salvador did not only push to make Bitcoin legal in the country, he is also building a Bitcoin-based city in the country.

Our story today is on Billionaire Didi Taihuttu, the Patriarch of what has been dubbed “Bitcoin Family” and his family of five. This patriarch is settling down with his family of five in Portugal because of its zero-tax policy on Bitcoin.

In the last five years, all the Dutch family did was travel around the world and after 40 countries, the family has finally decided to settle in Portugal known to be a “crypto tax haven” because of its no-tax policy on Bitcoin.

According to what the patriarch said, “You don’t pay any capital gains tax or anything else in Portugal on cryptocurrency. As long as you don’t earn cryptocurrency for providing services in Portugal, you’re in the clear. That’s a very beautiful Bitcoin heaven”.

Back in 2017, the family of five liquidated all that they owned, including a 2,500 square foot house, and purchased Bitcoin which was trading at $900. Today, the family keeps all of their crypto assets in secret vaults on four different continents. “I have hidden the hardware wallets across several countries so that I never have to fly very far if I need to access my cold wallet, in order to jump out of the market”. What this ultimately means is that what the country owns is worth having to travel miles across the world to redeem their decentralized cash. Phew….

The Bitcoin Family may, however, not be the only set of people moving to Portugal because of its favourable stance on cryptocurrencies. The country’s 2021 population census showed that foreigners living in the country had increased by 40 percent in the last ten years. In 2021, the country also ranked fourth on the Global Peace Index and was one of the best countries to move to that same year.

Apart from his immediate family, Didi Taihuttu’s sibling may also be making the moves to move to Portugal as they were last seen selling their houses and investing the money into Bitcoin. “We will all be travelling together as one big Bitcoin family which is, of course, really cool”, the billionaire hinted.

Portugal sees cryptocurrencies as a form of payment unlike countries such as the US which see them as taxable assets. Like fiat currencies, gains from buying or selling cryptocurrency are not taxed; crypto transactions or their exchange for money are excluded from a value-added tax (VAT).

Head of Tax Strategy at crypto tax software company CoinTracker, Shehan Chandraskera explained that “Capital gains resulting from crypto transactions such as cashing out and crypto-to-crypto trades are not subject to personal income taxes. This makes Portugal a really attractive place for crypto users to live”.

The case is slightly different for people and businesses that earn in crypto. They are subject to tax under peculiar situations. “If you earn cryptocurrency by providing services in Portugal, you need to pay tax on those cryptocurrencies, but I don’t earn anything, at the moment, in Portugal. So for me, it’s 0% tax”, Didi Taihuttu said.

The billionaire who is already settling with his family mentioned that establishing residency for his family was quite easy and devoid of hassles. The family currently doesn’t own any property but are considered official residents in the country. If it were other crypto tax havens, say, Puerto Rico, they would have been required to spend a period of time or own property to become official residents.

Under the law, citizens of the European Union can apply to become permanent residents in Portugal. For citizens out of the EU, the country offers residency through a number of ways including its golden Visa and the D7 Visa, which both attract a lot of wealthy expatriates.

Didi Taihittu went on saying that “We don’t need to be there, and that’s the beautiful part. There’s no minimum requirement of staying a day in Portugal, so it’s an easy setup”.

The Taihuttus have big plans already! They plan on building their own crypto village in Portugal and are already shopping for real estate, narrowing their options to three different plots of lands along Portugal’s southern coastline in the Algarve. The family’s plan entails running the “village” in a decentralized manner that’ll see the land divided into square meters and sold as NFTs in order to signify ownership. The patriarch will also be mining Bitcoin with solar and wind power. He also mentioned using a decentralized autonomous organization to govern the community.

Apart from Portugal, there are a few other places that crypto enthusiasts can move to for crypto-related reasons. One that tops the list is El Salvador.

Last year, El Salvador adopted Bitcoin as a legal tender, the first and only country to do so. Shortly after that, the country announced “Bitcoin City”, a city based on Bitcoin. This “Bitcoin City” will be located along the Gulf of Fonseca situated near a volcano. The idea is to make the volcano a source of power for Bitcoin mining. It is the government’s plan to provide energy for both Bitcoin mining activities and the city from the volcano.

Looking to attract foreign investment in the country, El Salvador announced plans to exempt foreign investors from paying taxes on Bitcoin gains. “If a person has assets in Bitcoin and makes high profits, there will be no tax. This obviously is to encourage foreign investment”, the President’s legal advisor Javier Argueta said last year.

Cryptocurrencies, especially Bitcoin, have been largely criticized. But there seem to be a “small” group of people like the Taihuttu family that have placed all their belief and hopes on cryptocurrencies.

As of the time of making this draft, Bitcoin was trading at $42,664.60.