Coinbase was the first crypto John Doe summons. It was not a one-off. In 2021 and 2022, federal courts authorized the IRS to serve John Doe summonses involving three more targets: Circle, SFOX, and a bank that provided services to SFOX customers.

The bank is the part people miss. It tells you the IRS does not need to subpoena every crypto platform directly. It can go to the place where crypto meets dollars.

Each of the summaries below comes from the court records themselves: the government’s petitions and the orders authorizing service. I am not adding details those records do not contain.

Circle: April 1, 2021, District of Massachusetts

On April 1, 2021, the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts entered an order granting the government’s petition for leave to serve a John Doe summons on Circle Internet Financial, Inc., and its predecessors, subsidiaries, divisions and affiliates, “including Poloniex LLC.” The order defines the John Does as United States persons with authority over Circle accounts “with at least the equivalent of $20,000 in value of transactions (regardless of type) in cryptocurrency in any one year, for the period beginning January 1, 2016, through December 31, 2020.” In re Tax Liabilities of John Does, No. 1:21-mc-91201-RGS, Dkt. 5 (D. Mass. Apr. 1, 2021).

The docket shows the order was entered by Judge Richard G. Stearns. The order states the court’s determination that the summons relates to an ascertainable group, that there is a reasonable basis for believing the group has failed or may have failed to comply with the internal revenue laws, that the information is not readily available from other sources, and that it is narrowly tailored.

The Circle order came on April 1, 2021. The Kraken order followed on May 5, 2021, after the scope fight described in the Kraken summons guide.

SFOX: August 15, 2022, Central District of California

On August 15, 2022, Judge Otis D. Wright II of the Central District of California entered an order granting the government’s ex parte petition and authorizing the IRS to serve a John Doe summons on Ox Labs Inc. and Subsidiaries. United States v. John Does, No. 2:22-cv-05715-ODW, Dkt. 11 (C.D. Cal. Aug. 15, 2022). The petition identifies the company as Ox Labs Inc., doing business as SFOX, headquartered in Los Angeles.

The petition defined the group as United States persons with authority over SFOX accounts “with at least the equivalent of $20,000 in value of transactions (regardless of type) in cryptocurrency in any one year, for the period January 1, 2016 through December 31, 2021.” No. 2:22-cv-05715-ODW, Dkt. 1.

M.Y. Safra Bank: September 2022, Southern District of New York

In the Southern District of New York, the government filed a parallel petition for leave to serve a John Doe summons on M.Y. Safra Bank. Judge Paul G. Gardephe signed the order granting it on September 21, 2022, and it was entered September 22, 2022. In re Tax Liabilities of John Does, No. 1:22-mc-00213-PGG, Dkt. 9 (S.D.N.Y.).

The petition explains the connection. It targets the same group of SFOX customers, U.S. persons with at least the equivalent of $20,000 in value of cryptocurrency transactions in any one year from 2016 through 2021, and states that “M.Y. Safra offered certain banking services to SFOX customers during the timeframe at issue.” No. 1:22-mc-00213, Dkt. 8.

Why the bank summons matters

A crypto platform knows your wallet addresses and trades. A bank knows your name, your Social Security number and where the dollars went. Put the two together and the matching problem gets easy.

The legal standard did not change for a bank. IRC 7609(f) still required the IRS to show an ascertainable group, a reasonable basis to believe the group may have failed to comply, and that the information was not readily available from other sources, with a request narrowly tailored to the suspected noncompliance. See how the 7609(f) test works. What changed was the target. Every on-ramp and off-ramp between crypto and dollars is a potential record keeper.

This is also why “I only used a small platform” is not a strategy. If dollars moved through a bank to fund or cash out your crypto, there is a second set of records.

If you used more than one platform

Most active traders did. That creates a problem the summons cases illustrate well. One platform may show you buying. Another may show you selling. A bank may show the dollars arriving. None of them, alone, shows your gain. Together, they show the IRS that money moved and let it ask you to explain the rest.

Your defense is your own reconciliation. For every account in the window, gather the transaction history, the deposit and withdrawal records, and the bank statements that tie dollars in and out. Match transfers between platforms so they are not mistaken for sales or purchases. Then compare the resulting gains and losses to what you filed. If you cannot document basis for coins you moved between platforms, read rebuilding missing cost basis before you assume the worst.

A clean reconciliation turns a frightening pile of third-party records into a confirmation that your return was right. A missing one leaves the IRS to fill in the blanks, and it will not fill them in your favor.

If the reconciliation shows a real gap, resist the urge to fix it quietly and hope. A correction that is complete, documented and filed before the IRS asks is the strongest position you can build. A partial correction that leaves out the platform you are nervous about is the weakest. The IRS fraud handbook specifically lists “reporting digital asset activity which occurred at some exchanges but intentional failure to report digital asset transactions which occurred at other exchanges” as an indicator of fraud. See IRM 25.1.2.11.1.

The pattern across all of them

Look at the scope in each petition: at least the equivalent of $20,000 in value of cryptocurrency transactions in any one year, over a multi-year window ending one or two years before the order. That mirrors the narrowed Coinbase summons, which the First Circuit described as covering users with $20,000 of any one type of transaction in any one year. See the Coinbase order.

The threshold is a court-approved way of defining an ascertainable group the IRS believes is likely to include people who did not report. It is not a safe harbor below $20,000. The reporting obligation applies to every dollar, as the IRS told crypto holders in its 2019 letters: you must report virtual currency transactions “regardless of whether you received a payee statement.”

Who should be paying attention

If you were a U.S. taxpayer and any of these describe you, assume your records were within the authorized scope:

  • You transacted at least the equivalent of $20,000 in cryptocurrency through Circle or Poloniex in any of 2016 through 2020.
  • You transacted at least the equivalent of $20,000 through SFOX in any of 2016 through 2021.
  • You were an SFOX customer who used banking services M.Y. Safra Bank offered to SFOX customers.

Then do the work: rebuild the activity, compare it to your returns, and identify which years are open under IRC 6501. Remember that John Doe summonses can suspend the assessment period under IRC 7609(e)(2) if the summoned party’s response is unresolved six months after service.

Summonses are the old way. 1099-DA is the new way.

These cases were about past years, before brokers filed crypto information returns. Under the final regulations at Treas. Reg. 1.6045-1, brokers report gross proceeds on Form 1099-DA for digital asset sales on or after January 1, 2025, and report basis for certain covered assets acquired on or after January 1, 2026. See the 1099-DA effective dates.

So for current years, the IRS often will not need a court. The forms arrive on their own. The summons cases still matter for older years, and they tell you something about how the IRS thinks: find the records, define the group, match the names.

If one of these windows covers you and you are not sure your returns were right, that is a conversation to have with a lawyer before the IRS starts it.