CRA will wish to learn about Taylor Swift ticket revenue

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Taylor Swift wrapped up her 149-show, 20-month Eras Tour with a sold-out live performance in entrance of 60,000 followers in Vancouver on Sunday night time. And, whereas an estimated 10 million fortunate followers globally obtained to attend one among her exhibits, numerous others benefited from reselling their coveted tickets, for earnings within the hundreds of {dollars}.

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For instance, a relative instructed me that he obtained a pre-sale code to purchase tickets, with the intention of taking his fiancée, however when he came upon how a lot he may get for his three floor-level seats to one of many six Toronto exhibits, he determined to promote the tickets on-line. He cleared over $10,000 in revenue – sufficient to pay for the band at his marriage ceremony reception subsequent summer time. Equally, a Toronto buddy was capable of safe tickets within the pre-sale to attend one of many Vancouver exhibits along with his two grownup daughters, however after researching the price of flights and discovering exorbitant resort charges for the weekend, determined to resell the tickets on-line, pocketing hundreds in revenue.

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After I nonchalantly reminded every of them to not overlook to report their ticket resale earnings on their 2024 tax returns, they every appeared considerably shocked. Which begs the query: Is the revenue from the sale of live performance tickets actually taxable, and, in that case, how ought to it’s reported in your Canadian tax return?

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I might recommend that, for most individuals, apart from skilled ticket-resellers who make it their enterprise to purchase and promote tickets at a revenue, live performance tickets are capital property, which means that the revenue from a resale of tickets can be handled as a capital achieve. That’s, the proceeds acquired from the sale, much less the price of the tickets (your adjusted price base or ACB) can be a capital achieve.

For people with lower than $250,000 of annual capital positive aspects in a yr, the achieve can be 50 per cent taxable, which means that even somebody within the prime tax bracket of 53 per cent in Ontario or British Columbia would pay a most prime fee of about 26 per cent capital positive aspects tax on their Swift ticket earnings. (Below proposed laws, which was to be efficient June 25, 2024, in case your positive aspects are over $250,000 yearly, the inclusion fee on capital positive aspects was elevated to 66.67 per cent, which means that the highest capital positive aspects tax fee can be nearer to 35 per cent.)

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However, there are literally some particular guidelines for the sale of what’s generally known as “personal-use property” (PUP). PUP refers to gadgets that you just personal primarily on your or your loved ones’s private use or enjoyment, corresponding to private and home goods, for instance, furnishings, cars, boats, a cottage, and different related property. One may make the case that live performance tickets are PUP, since they’re for the purchaser’s private use.

Below the PUP guidelines, if the quantity you paid (your ACB) is lower than $1,000, it’s deemed to be $1,000 for tax functions. Equally, if the money you obtain while you promote PUP is lower than $1,000, your proceeds from the sale for tax functions are additionally handled as being $1,000. The sensible results of these guidelines is that if each the ACB and the money you obtain on your PUP are each underneath $1,000, you don’t need to report any achieve or loss in your tax return. Be aware that underneath the Revenue Tax Act, you can not have a capital loss from the sale of most PUP.

Let’s say Katy purchased two Swift tickets through the fan pre-sale for $250 every or $500 for the pair. She was capable of resell them on StubHub for $5,500 whole, yielding a $5,000 revenue. For tax functions, the ACB of her tickets can be deemed to be $1,000. Katy will understand a capital achieve for tax functions of $4,500. Whereas it might be tempting to say that every ticket is its personal PUP and thus ought to have its personal ACB of $1,000, particular guidelines apply the place the PUP you personal is taken into account to be a part of a set, and also you get rid of the set to 1 individual. If these guidelines apply, Katy’s ACB of the 2 tickets collectively are deemed to be $1,000.

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A bunch of things is handled as a set the place the gadgets would ordinarily be disposed of collectively, and are usually regarded as belonging collectively. Usually their worth as a set is larger than the entire worth of the person items. The set is deemed to be one single PUP, and the $1,000 minimal price and proceeds will probably be shared by all the properties within the set. This rule is in place to forestall somebody from promoting elements of a set in a sequence of transactions to the identical purchaser, after which utilizing the $1,000 minimal price for every transaction to cut back the general achieve for tax functions.

Now, let’s say you acquire your Swift tickets with no intention of ever going to the live performance. In case your function from day one was to revenue from the ticket resale, then your achieve is prone to be thought of totally taxable self-employment enterprise revenue. Whereas it might be onerous for the Canada Income Company (CRA) to find out your unique intent retroactively, the company could look to see how quickly you listed the tickets for resale after buy (an hour later? a day? per week?).

You might be tempted to easily not report your Swift ticket resale in your return, maybe since you consider that your Swift revenue is akin to a tax-free windfall, like a lottery win. For those who’re incorrect, the penalty for unreported revenue could be 10 per cent of the revenue you did not report if that is the second time you didn’t report revenue within the present and prior three tax years. And, that’s along with the tax on the achieve, and non-deductible arrears curiosity.

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Questioning how the CRA would possibly catch you? In recent times, the CRA has been identified to invoke the “unnamed individuals” rule within the Tax Act, which may require a third-party corresponding to a ticket-resale or fee facilitation enterprise to supply info or any paperwork regarding unnamed individuals to the CRA. To take action, nonetheless, the CRA should first acquire permission from a choose.

Whereas some readers could accuse me of being casually merciless within the identify of being trustworthy, in case you fail to report your Taylor Swift earnings in your 2024 tax return subsequent spring, and also you get reassessed for unreported revenue, you might be in for a merciless summer time.

Jamie Golombek, FCPA, FCA, CFP, CLU, TEP, is the managing director, Tax & Property Planning with CIBC Personal Wealth in Toronto. [email protected].

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