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Tax on Poker winnings - Sorry think I put this on wrong thread earlier
StayOrGo
Member Posts: 12,197
Hi Tikay, or anyone who may be able to help.
I have been playing poker recreationally for a few years now and over the last 6 months my results have been quite good.
I am considering playing for a living, but have a couple of questions about tax on poker winnings.
Firstly, in the UK, is it correct that poker winnings are tax free?
Secondly, if I were fortunate enough to be sponsored for tournaments, does that change anything about the tax issue?
Thirdly, presumably potential advertising revenue would be taxable.
Many thanks
Graham (STAYORGO)
I have been playing poker recreationally for a few years now and over the last 6 months my results have been quite good.
I am considering playing for a living, but have a couple of questions about tax on poker winnings.
Firstly, in the UK, is it correct that poker winnings are tax free?
Secondly, if I were fortunate enough to be sponsored for tournaments, does that change anything about the tax issue?
Thirdly, presumably potential advertising revenue would be taxable.
Many thanks
Graham (STAYORGO)
Comments
However, unless you have like zero responsibility and can just give it a go and not really care if it fails, I would recommend waiting ALOT more than 6 months of things going well before deciding you can do it as a living.
What stakes do you pay and how much are you winning per month? I'm not bothered if you don't wanna post how much you win a month, but just take an average of them 6 months and are you consistently making £1500+ a month, because otherwise it's gonna be pretty easy to beat that with a normal job and still earn say £400 a month on the side.
Now my average MTT is about $100
I'm thinking of giving it another two months to get to $50K profit, then giving it a go. Does that sound feasible?
Thanks again for the feedback.
Cheers Graham (STAYORGO)
This has been debated extensively and is a sore point for many. You see all those poker pros on TV? Well you are paying for their kids' education, their dentists, their police etc and they're not contributing to yours! If you're on a minimum wage and a poker pro is taking home 200k per year - guess who subsidises who. Yep - you guessed it!
It always makes me laugh when people are asked "Which poker pro do you admire most?" If they ever asked me (they wouldn't) the answer would be "Any of them who decides to pay their taxes and contribute to society instead of taking from it".
Oh - they do pay VAT on their purchases though. And council tax. Just like everyone else.
Are you playing a massive amount of tournaments or have you been getting a few big cashes cos obviously you need to know that even if you're Phil Ivey you could still go through a patch of not winning anything for a long time (depending on how many tournies you play).
Like I said in my other post, I dunno what your situation is in terms of responsibility, whether you have kids/a family, live in your own place and so pay all your own bills and stuff, but I remember a long time ago a guy on here called Gliterbabe who is a VERY good player who plays full-time said that before you start you should make sure you have enough money aside so that if you didn't win/withdraw any money you'd be able to pay your bills for 6 months out of your own pocket.
Virtually all money from poker comes from players so,
all winnings - all losses = zero or near enough
Would seem like a lot of a trouble to set up a taxation system to claim back nought.
Very very true, never thought of it like that.
Pro poker players make a lot of money for the site.
The Site makes a lot of money that is taxed.
Therefore poker players DO contribute to tax...
QED
Its not our decison to whether we pay tax, its the governments. If they started taxing poker then i would pay no problem, youre making out like were tax dodgers.