People often joke that the only certainties in life are death and taxes. Well, it turns out that, when it comes to the report of Foreign Bank and Financial Account (FBAR) penalties, death may have finally met its match. The Southern District of Florida issued a decision in United States v. Green, 2020 BL 165965 [...]
On April 24, 2020, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) issued an internal memo advising its employees that it would be recalling those employees involved in “mission critical” operations. This internal memo represents the most significant update to the IRS’s “People First Initiative,” a program intended to respond to the challenges of COVID-19 by providing a [...]
The recently imposed social distancing measures that are critical and essential to our nation’s battle with the coronavirus have had a dramatic impact on everyone’s everyday life. No one is exempt or excused from that impact. This includes our nation’s taxing authorities. The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has created and is updating a website to [...]
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) announced, in a recent Information Release and Fact Sheet, that it is going to make more site visits to taxpayers who have delinquent-filed tax returns. Fact Sheet 2020-02 notes that this increased use of compliance strategies is being fueled by the IRS’s increased use of data analytics, research, and other [...]
The fight over who meets the definition of a “real estate professional” is not a new one. Fortunately, the taxpayer’s burden for satisfying that definition has only been eased by the expansion of digital tools available for tracking time. That being said, the United States Tax Court’s (Court’s) memorandum opinion in Hairston v. Comm’r of [...]
For many taxpayers with multiple active business interests, the material participation test can be a significant tax trap. If the elements of that test are not met, the impact could be that the taxpayer is limited in how the income/loss from that business is recognized on their personal tax return. A recent decision in the [...]
For many business taxpayers who have Small Business Administration (SBA) financing that ultimately goes into default, it can be difficult to work with an SBA receiver and operate a business. While understanding that relationship requires an expertise that is outside the scope of this article, a recent Eleventh Circuit Court case confirmed that employment taxes [...]
The recent enactment of the Tax Cut and Jobs Act (TCJA) put many individual taxpayers in a difficult position regarding their estimated tax obligations for the 2018 tax year. Fortunately, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) released Information Release and Notice (IR) 2019-55 expanding the guidance for penalty relief relating to the underpayment of individual income [...]
The United States Tax Court (Court) recently issued a decision highlighting, yet again, the importance of clear drafting in settlement agreements. In Doyle v. Comm’r of Internal Revenue, T.C. Memo. 2019-8, the Court held that the taxpayer could not exclude amounts, pursuant to Internal Revenue Code § 104(a)(2), that he received from a settlement agreement. [...]
The marijuana industry remains in a difficult position when it comes to the federal tax implications for those involved in that industry. There is more detail here regarding the tax trap facing the marijuana industry. The United States Tax Court (Court) issued a decision in Patients Mutual Assistance Collective Corp., et al. v. Comm’r of [...]