The livestream ”Bingbing’s Plus-Size Style Guide” has been a massive hit. With 500,000 followers, an average of over 17 hours of live streaming per day, and a peak of 80,000 concurrent viewers per session, total sales have exceeded 3 million items. Women’s clothing priced between 19.9 and 29.9 yuan has generated cumulative sales of 72.97 million yuan.

However, from 2020 to 2025, this store never filed for tax registration. It didn't pay a single penny in taxes.

In April 2026, the Audit Bureau of the Anshan Municipal Taxation Bureau conducted a thorough investigation. Li Bing, the actual operator of the business, had underpaid VAT, individual income tax, and other taxes totaling 1.6263 million yuan. He was ultimately required to pay a total of 2.4318 million yuan in back taxes and fines, plus late payment penalties.

01

Tax Evasion Tactics Used by E-commerce Live Streamers

Li Bing’s case is not an isolated incident. On July 10, 2026, Xinhua News Agency reported on seven cases of tax evasion by online stores run by internet celebrities that were publicly disclosed by tax authorities. Combined with the four cases disclosed earlier this year, at least 11 such cases have been made public so far this year.

These cases reveal some of the most common tax evasion schemes:

No registration, no filing.Take Li Bing, for example: his business is booming, but the store doesn’t show up in the tax authority’s system. By the time the tax authorities track you down through tip-offs or by cross-referencing platform data, you’ll have racked up a massive tax debt spanning several years.

Income from services is reclassified as business income.Internet celebrities and live-streamers have been classifying platform tips and product placement fees as ”business income” to reduce their tax burden through the fixed-rate taxation system for self-employed individuals. However, this tactic will largely become ineffective by 2026—tax authorities” big data can accurately identify anomalous accounts characterized by ”high popularity but low reported income.”

Payments received through private channels are not recorded in the books.Drive traffic from live streams to WeChat, accept payments via private transfers, and do not deposit funds into the company’s official account. But don’t forget: once the “Regulations on the Reporting of Tax-Related Information by Internet Platform Enterprises” take effect in June 2025, platforms must report transaction data to tax authorities in accordance with the prescribed standards. Private domain data is also included in the scope of the comparison.

Escape-style deregistration.Some people close their companies after evading taxes, thinking that without a legal entity, they’ll get away with it. However, according to Article 52 of the Tax Collection and Administration Law, tax authorities are not subject to any time limits when collecting back taxes for tax evasion, tax resistance, or tax fraud. Even if a company is dissolved, its registration can be reinstated to collect the back taxes.

02

The Value-Added Tax Law Has Dramatically Increased the Cost of Tax Evasion

The Value-Added Tax Law, which takes effect on January 1, 2026, contains a provision that will have a devastating impact on live streamers.

In the past, many live-streamers maintained their ”small-scale taxpayer” status by concealing their income, thereby enjoying low tax rates ranging from 1% to 3%. If they were audited, the back taxes they owed were also calculated based on the small-scale taxpayer rate.

Things are different now. Announcement No. 2 of 2026 clearly states that if tax authorities determine a taxpayer does not meet the criteria for small-scale taxpayer status, they may require the taxpayer to calculate and pay taxes in accordance with the regulations for general taxpayers. Furthermore, sales revenue resulting from self-assessment and supplementary reporting, risk control verification, or audit-based adjustments must be recorded in the corresponding tax period based on when the tax liability arose.

What does that mean? If a streamer violates regulations by concealing income to maintain small-scale business status, once investigated, the tax authorities can retroactively assess back taxes at the general taxpayer rate of 13.1%, rather than the 11% to 31% range. When the back taxes, late payment penalties, and fines are added together, the total cost can easily multiply several times over.

03

Compliance Is Not a Matter of Choice

A figure in the Xinhua News Agency’s July 10 news analysis is worth noting: online retail sales are projected to reach 15.97 trillion yuan in 2025, representing a year-over-year increase of 8.6%. As the platform economy continues to expand, tax regulation has kept pace.

Professor Gu Cheng of Dongbei University of Finance and Economics put it bluntly: ”Taxpayers should not consider tax evasion as an option. Relying on tax big data, tax authorities can accurately identify anomalies such as high business volume but low tax returns. Once investigated, the cost of violating the law is much higher than it used to be.”

For individuals and teams currently engaged in live-streaming e-commerce, there are several things you should do right now: verify that your business entity’s tax registration status is in compliance (stop operating without a license); check whether your platform transaction records match your reported income; if you’re a sole proprietor, assess whether you need to switch to audited accounting; and consider incorporating payments received through private channels into your public account for tax reporting.

Ultimately, the cost of tax evasion has irreversibly risen. The supporting regulations for the Value-Added Tax Law, platform data reporting, and tax big data comparisons—these three safeguards have squeezed the room for tax evasion to its absolute limit. Getting compliant early on is far cheaper than having to pay back taxes after being audited.

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