EDIT: to highlight a point that may have been missed further down: you are though still liable to income tax, aswell as those in your family if you gift them the coins if an individual or corporation tax if a company
but to clarify the point on capital gains tax that has been asked many times on different threads. in the UK, bitcoins are free from capital gains tax, because they are an asset(personal possession) which is under the CGT threshold of £6000 each.
now the long answer to explain why
bitcoin is: a personal possession asset
remember an asset is a product that stores value. such as art, antiques, your car. Things that cant really be used or changed into anything else but its sole purpose. it is an end product.
what bitcoin is not:
bitcoins are not a commodity.
remember a commodity is a basic good/raw material used in commerce for the production of other goods or services.
do not get confused by the stupidly named method of making your asset being called mining, to think of them as anything like gold.
bitcoins are not a division of a percentage of ownership of a company (shares)
bitcoins are not a division of a percentage of ownership of a product a company holds (stocks)
bitcoins are not the purchase of government debt (bonds)
unless a single bitcoin (set of satoshi's) gains the value of £6000 EACH you don't have to worry about capital gains tax. you can own as many assets and sell as many assets but as long as the individual value does not exceed £6k each your safe from capital gains tax.
EG i can have a picasso, a Monet, and a Rembrandt (paintings) and sell them all to one buyer at the same time and they would not be classed as set. unless they formed a well known grouping OR gave them much more value sold together then the combined total of selling them individually.
bitcoins do not come in sets. as there is no finite amount of bitcoin units to say you have a complete 'set'. there is no general term for (EG 500BTC) groups that everyone is aware of or comfortable to use in daily conversations that gives a set group of bitcoins more value selling them as the group then the combined value of selling them individually.
so treat a bitcoin as a sole asset or a 'set' of satoshi's.
so unless 1BTC or 100,000,000sat 'set' became £6k each, you have got no worry's about capital gains tax. just worry about income tax if your an individual or corporation tax if a business.
speak with an accountant for a more deeper explanation of assets or read this
http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/cgt/possessions/basics.htm
hope this makes sense
edited parts to make it simple to understand to the lay man
please consult an accountant before taking ANYONES word as gospal
