Welcome back to Inside Basis, our monthly newsletter for all things crypto accounting and tax! We have a busy schedule the next few weeks and are excited to share some company updates as well. To round things off, we have a special Halloween surprise at the end (so keep reading!). 👻

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Hash Basis Beat

What’s new in the Hash Basis universe?

Our team is growing! To start off with, we’d like to welcome Christine as our newest member. She is our incredible Executive Assistant and will be helping out with all things admin at Hash Basis (and as a bonus, she’s also Mackenzie’s mom!). She’s based in Florida and when she’s not working, she loves taking walks around neighborhood parks and playing with her two grandsons, Jackson and Bowen.❣️ You can reach her at christine@hashbasis.xyz.

We are also hiring for a new position, a part-time tax preparer! We’re looking to expand our crypto tax practice and offer an end-to-end tax filing service. Our ideal candidate is a seasoned tax professional that is looking to get “start up” experience in the crypto tax world.

You can find our job posting here - if you know someone who would be an excellent fit, please forward this along!

Upcoming Events

Quickbooks Connect 2023

Mackenzie will be presenting about DAOs and crypto accounting basics at Quickbooks Connect in Las Vegas this November! From What is a DAO? to What is the crypto subledger market landscape?, Mackenzie will break down all aspects of crypto accounting and how to set up a DAO accounting system that is bulletproof.

Crypto Accounting Academy

This 6-week cohort is designed to give finance & accounting professionals a crash course in crypto accounting fundamentals. The course covers everything from treasury management to crypto subledger implementation. Mackenzie’s lesson will teach students how to navigate and extract accounting data from block explorers (even the most gnarly ones like Mintscan and Solana Explorer). Understanding block explorers is the first step in getting accurate, reconciled data, which is the key to healthy books. Registration for Cohort 1 is already closed, but you can register for Cohort 2 here.

And finally, we just released our latest article, Breaking Down the Thrilling World of Payroll Journal Entries! **There’s nothing crypto related in this article (gasp!), but it’s an interesting example of a fiat accounting staple that still seems shrouded in mystery. I mean, who actually understands payroll? 🤷🏻‍♀️

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We Read Crypto Twitter

(So You Don’t Have To)

Headliner news to pay attention to for crypto accounting & finance professionals

SEC Drops Charges Against Ripple Execs

The Ripple saga continues! On October 19, the SEC dropped charges against Ripple’s top executives, Brad Garlinghouse and Chris Larsen, that were named in the initial complaint back in December 2020. Specifically, the SEC said then -

According to the complaint, in addition to structuring and promoting the XRP sales used to finance the company's business, Larsen and Garlinghouse also effected personal unregistered sales of XRP totaling approximately $600 million. The complaint alleges that the defendants failed to register their offers and sales of XRP or satisfy any exemption from registration, in violation of the registration provisions of the federal securities laws. Source

The SEC retracted this and will just be pursuing Ripple (the company) for its potential violation of offering unregistered securities to institutional investors. It’s yet another win for crypto in this protracted case. 🎉

📢 Due Date Extended for Comment Letters For Treasury Regs 📢

Calling all crypto tax accountants! The due date for the comment letters for the proposed treasury and IRS regulations was extended from October 30 to November 13, 2023 (thank goodness 😅). We encourage you to submit your opinion so we have regulations that make sense and are beneficial for the long-term success of our industry.

Basis Bytes

Practical tips & tricks for all the crypto accountants out there (as confirmed at the Crypto Finance Forum, there are more than 5 of us!)

How to Open Large Genesis Files in VSCode

This tip is taken from our upcoming lesson about block explorers! When reconciling token balances, you sometimes need to find the genesis file for the protocol. A genesis file is a json file that contains the mainnet start date and beginning account balances for certain wallet addresses. You’d be surprised how much information you can find in these jewels!

For example, a validator could receive rewards upon mainnet launch because they participated in an incentivized testnet. These genesis rewards are typically not on the block explorer (they’re in block zero), so you have to dig for them on Github. The file size determines if you can open the genesis file in your browser - if it’s a substantial chain with lots of beginning balances, your browser will likely crash. 🤖

However, opening these files in a code editor like VSCode solves this conundrum. Let’s say we’re trying to open the genesis file for Akash network. To save this on your local computer, do the following:

A Special Halloween Treat 🎃

As a spooky treat, the first person to respond to this newsletter will win a piece of our signature swag! Simply send us your name, physical address and what your favorite part about Hash Basis is. We hope everyone has a spine-tingling and safe Halloween - and just remember, we’re so into accounting here at Hash Basis that Mackenzie even dressed up as Luca Pacioli, the Father of Accounting, for Halloween!

Catch you next month 👻

- The Hash Basis team