Investing.com – Cryptocurrency prices gained on Monday, with Bitcoin and Litecoin trading about 3% higher. Reports that the fourth largest crypto exchange Bitfinex is giving out its customers’ data to the government received some attention.
Bitcoin was trading at $8,510.8 by 12:20AM ET (04:20GMT) on the Bitfinex exchange, up 2.9% over the previous 24 hours.
Ethereum, the world’s second largest cryptocurrency by market cap, gained 1.5% at $712.57 on the Bitfinex exchange.
Ripple’s XRP token climbed 2.4% higher to $0.69553 on the Poloniex exchange.
Meanwhile, Litecoin added 3.2% to $138.63.
Bitfinex is cooperating with the government in an attempt to clamp down on bitcoin tax evaders, reports on Monday suggested.
The crypto exchange sent notices to its customers recently to notify them they must send in their tax information to British Virgin Island authorities, a move that traders find disappointing as some of them started withdrawing money from Bitfinex, reports said.
“Under the laws of the British Virgin Islands (which are applicable to entities organized in the British Virgin Islands, including us), we are required to report certain account information to the [British Virgin Island] government,” the notice read, adding “The government of the [British Virgin Island] may then exchange that information with the tax authorities of the customer’s country of residence.”
Elsewhere, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) revealed on Monday that Australian lost at least $2.1 million to crypto-based scams in 2017.
“Examples of cryptocurrency scams in 2017 include fake ‘initial coin offerings’ which, like initial stock offerings, purport to be the launch of a new cryptocurrency,” the ACCC said in an annual scam report released today.
“As the value of actual cryptocurrencies increased, so too did the scam losses in what people thought were real investments,” it added.