Tax question for SNGs

[Sparta45]

OP: Your total winnings are included in your income. You then put in all your losses as itemized deductions. You do not net them.

Go see a tax professional though....not some H&R block monkey....but a CPA who has a tax business.

[MikeMcQ1]

Also, money won that is sitting in your PokerStars or whatever site's account is taxable income. No, it does not matter if you haven't withdrew or placed it in a 3rd party bank account. It's income, and it's taxable.

[Strickly Bidness]

Fellas,

Correct way to do it is itemize every single session that you play and submit it all to the IRS. Nobody does that because it is too hard. I only make like 30K/year playing and that might be 45K in wins and 15K in losses so I put "poker hobby" on the other income line with 45K in winnings and 15K in losses. I pay income tax on 30K of winnings. The IRS never cares . I have a full time job and itemize.

If you are a pro who makes huge cash then just hire somebody. Otherwise I think the gov'ment will just be happy you gave them some of your winnings.

[Kevin8423]

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Do you guys only count what you pull out of the poker site? How does this work? Not that I have any winnings but my thinking was that it was only profit once you took it out. Maybe the dumbest thing ever posted on 2+2, I dont know.

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Income is income. Whether you cash out or not.

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huh? I'm pretty sure if it doesn't leave the actual poker site, you don't have to worry about it. It's one thing if it goes in to a 3rd party bank/transfer system.

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Legally you are obligated to pay it as income and legally you are obligated to report your poker account if it is over $10,000 as an offshore account. That's the only advice worth giving over the internet.

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While probably true I think thats pretty ridiculous, if you had 10k in your account and were breakeven over the entire next year would you be obligated to retax the same amount of money?

I also think its probably impossible for you to get in trouble for not including money sitting in your account in your taxes. Once you take it out thats a different story.

[Slim Pickens]

Kevin, 10k-10k is 0k. You pay taxes on your profits, but it doesn't matter where they are. The 10k number comes up as the limit above which you have to report a foreign account. You just have to tell them it exists.

[Kevin8423]

So youre saying you have 12k.. report and tax it, over the next year you either don't play (or withdrawl) or you breakeven. The next year you report it again, but put your income as $0.

Correct?

[NU Star]

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So youre saying you have 12k.. report and tax it, over the next year you either don't play (or withdrawl) or you breakeven. The next year you report it again, but put your income as $0.

Correct?

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Whatever your deposits were you don't have to pay taxes for. Otherwise, when you report all additional earnings have to be accounted for in that period, a previous period, or in the form of late taxes + penalties.

[ender]

You have to total all your winning sessions as one sum, X, and all your losing sessions, Y. You report X as gambling winnings and deduct Y as your losses. You cannot just claim the net (X-Y). You must record table numbers, start time, finish time, limit and total.

There is some disagreement as to what defines a session. I personally record all the consecutive SNGs I play as a session, which allows multiple sessions a day.

What sucks is you can potentially break even and pay more taxes than if you had not played poker at all.

If you are asking this question this late, you probably are not keeping good enough records. Never too late too start though.