The liquidators of disgraced bitcoin trading site Mirror Trading International (MTI) have denied the company owes the SA Revenue Service (SARS) almost R1 billion in back taxes and penalties, saying its actual tax liability is zero.
MTI was a South African cryptocurrency investment portal that enticed thousands of members to buy bitcoin with promises of sky-high returns. It collapsed in late 2020 after securing billions of rands in investments.
Since early 2021, liquidators have been scouring the internet to track down thousands of missing bitcoin.
In July, SARS lodged a claim against MTI, at a meeting of creditors, for R931 million in income tax and penalties.
Were the site's liquidators to hand over R931 million to SARS, there would be little left to pay out to claimants and investors as part of the winding-up process.
The liquidators have thus far only managed to recover 1 281 bitcoin worth R1.05 billion from FXChoice, an online forex broker which froze MTI's assets in June 2020.
Meanwhile, claims of R1.3 billion have been submitted against the insolvent estate.
No liability
This week the MTI's liquidators said they had submitted tax returns declaring zero tax liability.
They said in a statement:
SARS will now consider the objection. If the tax agency still finds that MTI owes R931 million, the liquidators can take the matter to a tax board or court.
The liquidators said it was the fault of MTI's former leadership that no tax returns were submitted.
According to their calculations, MTI suffered an accumulated tax loss of R110 million over the applicable years of assessment.
"The result is that MTI has no tax liability towards SARS."