On October 31, 2022, the Illinois Department of Revenue released new guidance providing clarity on the treatment of cryptocurrency. The Department’s guidance provides that Illinois conforms to the federal tax treatment of treating cryptocurrency as property. The new guidance also states that, for purposes of the applicability of Public Law 86-272 to an out-of-state company that sells cryptocurrency to customers in Illinois, the transaction will be treated as a sale of intangible property. In addition, the Department clarified that for apportionment purposes, the sale of cryptocurrency will be treated as a sale of intangible property for purpose of computing the sales factor. And, if an employee is paid with cryptocurrency, the fair market value of the cryptocurrency is subject to withholding and payroll taxes. A payment using cryptocurrency, however, is not subject to the same information reporting requirement as other payments made in property.

Illinois Dept. of Rev. General Information Letter IT 22-0010-GIL (July 15, 2022).