Washington, DC, Attorney General Karl Racine today announced that he is filing civil charges against cloud computing software company MicroStrategy and its founder Michael Saylor over alleged tax fraud.
MicroStrategy, which holds the largest Bitcoin treasury among public companies, has helped Saylor “evade taxes he legally owes on hundreds of millions of dollars he’s earned while living in DC,” Racine tweeted today.
Racine described Saylor as “a billionaire tech executive who has lived in the District for more than a decade, but has never paid any DC income taxes.”
It’s the first suit that the Attorney General is bringing under DC’s recently updated False Claims Law, he added, which “[encourages] whistleblowers to report residents who evade our tax laws by misrepresenting their residence.”
Saylor has yet to publicly respond to the action, as of this writing.
“With this lawsuit, we’re putting residents and employers on notice that if you enjoy all the benefits of living in our great city while refusing to pay your fair share in taxes, we will hold you accountable,” Racine added in a tweet thread.
Earlier this month, Saylor stepped down from his long-held role as MicroStrategy CEO to take on the new role of executive chairman, which he said would enable him to “double down” on the firm’s strategy of acquiring and holding large amounts of Bitcoin.
As of June 29, MicroStrategy held 129,699 BTC, which is worth nearly $2.6 billion today. According to the company, the coins were acquired at an average price of $30,664 apiece, so the firm’s investment is currently underwater.
Saylor and MicroStrategy previously settled charges of fraud from the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) back in 2000, after the company was alleged to have doctored its numbers and falsely reported profits despite losing money.
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