Trump’s ‘Big Beautiful Bill’ Passes Senate—Without Bitcoin Tax Exemptions

The U.S. Senate narrowly passed President Donald Trump’s massive reconciliation bill on Tuesday—but failed to include key tax amendments in the legislation that would have benefited crypto users.

In the hectic final hours of heated negotiations over the president’s “One Big, Beautiful Bill,” pro-crypto senators and industry policy leaders raced to tack an amendment onto the bill containing numerous long-sought tax benefits for crypto stakers and miners, businesses that hold crypto stockpiles, and retail digital assets users.

Ultimately, however, the clock ran out. Only over the weekend were the crypto tax provisions, spearheaded by Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-WY), deemed ready for showtime, sources previously told Decrypt. 

That timing led to a flurry of activity on Monday, with Lummis pledging to raise a related amendment during the marathon vote-a-rama on the “Big, Beautiful Bill” in the hours before its passage, and crypto policy leaders urging Americans to call their senators in a push to get the amendment to the Senate floor.

But by the time Vice President J.D. Vance cast the tie-breaking vote to pass the megabill midday Tuesday, Lummis and Republican colleagues had not yet managed to get the crypto included in deliberations. 

One crypto policy leader mourned the outcome as a “missed opportunity” for the industry.

“We just ran out of time,” they told Decrypt. 

A spokesperson for Senator Lummis offered a rosier outlook, telling Decrypt the issues involved in the crypto amendment are now on the radars of top Republicans, including Senate Finance Committee chair Mike Crapo (R-ID).

“Senator Lummis had productive conversations with Chairman Crapo and other Senate Finance Committee members over the last few weeks, and looks forward to continuing her work with the rest of the committee to fix these important tax issues at a later date,” the spokesperson said.

It’s not clear which elements of Lummis’ crypto tax provisions would have ultimately ended up in an amendment to the “Big, Beautiful Bill.” Crypto policy experts speculated it would have likely included a measure to clarify that rewards earned from staking and mining crypto should only be taxed once sold, not at the moment of their generation. 

Another measure likely to have been included in the amendment, dubbed a mark-to-market accounting provision, would have allowed companies greater flexibility in reporting unrealized crypto gains as a means of boosting their balance sheets. 

And a third measure—perhaps the most sought-after by retail crypto users—would have offered a de minimis tax exemption for crypto transactions under a certain threshold. The exemption would have allowed Americans to not report crypto transactions worth less than a few hundred dollars as taxable for capital gains purposes, and was seen by many in the industry as a path to greater adoption of crypto as a means to make more routine, everyday payments.

Edited by Andrew Hayward