Federal

  • May 03, 2024

    US Trade Position Seen Contradicting Stance In Pillar 1 Talks

    The U.S. trade representative's withdrawal of support for digital trade proposals has caused tax policy observers to worry that the U.S. position on trade is undermining that of U.S. Treasury Department officials negotiating a taxing rights overhaul at the OECD known as Pillar One.

  • May 03, 2024

    Weekly Internal Revenue Bulletin

    The Internal Revenue Service issued its weekly bulletin Friday, which included updated rates for foreign insurance company equations and an extension on excise tax relief for minimum plan distributions.

  • May 03, 2024

    Taxation With Representation: Skadden, Wachtell, Davis Polk

    In this week's Taxation With Representation, L'Occitane International said its executive director and chair is leading an offer to buy the company's shares he doesn't already own, UMB Financial agreed to purchase Heartland Financial USA, Medline said it agreed to acquire Ecolab's global surgical solutions business and The Mosaic Co. said it agreed to sell its stake in a phosphate production joint venture.

  • May 03, 2024

    IRS Can Assess Foreign Info Disclosure Penalty, DC Circ. Says

    The D.C. Circuit on Friday overturned a major U.S. Tax Court ruling that had struck down the Internal Revenue Service's authority to assess and administratively collect penalties from taxpayers for failing to file an information return on their interests in a foreign corporation.

  • May 03, 2024

    Final EV Tax Credit Regs Add New Battery Tracing Test

    The U.S. Treasury Department unveiled final regulations Friday for the up to $7,500 electric vehicle tax credit that include a more detailed process for automakers to trace the battery supply chain to qualify for the credit's domestic content requirements.

  • May 02, 2024

    Hahn Air To Pay Feds $26.8M To End FCA Travel Fees Suit

    Hahn Air Lines agreed to pay $26.8 million to resolve a whistleblower's allegations that the German airline-ticketing company violated the False Claims Act by intentionally failing to remit to the U.S. government certain travel fees the company collected from U.S. commercial airline passengers.

  • May 02, 2024

    Claimed Panama Papers Leaker Fights To Hide ID In €5M Suit

    A person claiming to be the Panama Papers leaker told a federal court they would fear for their life if the court made them disclose their identity in a €5 million ($6.3 million) suit against Germany, protesting a magistrate judge's suggestion that the suit be tossed because the person wouldn't identify themselves.

  • May 02, 2024

    Texas Tax Preparers Cop To $3.7M Tax Fraud Scheme

    The owner of a Texas tax preparation company and her two sisters who worked as employees all pled guilty Thursday to preparing nearly $3.7 million worth of false returns riddled with fraudulent credits, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.

  • May 02, 2024

    IRS To Boost Audit Rates By 50% On Wealthy, Werfel Says

    The Internal Revenue Service plans to nearly triple audit rates on corporations with assets over $250 million and increase audit rates by more than 50% on wealthy taxpayers with more than $10 million in total positive income by 2026, Commissioner Daniel Werfel said Thursday.

  • May 02, 2024

    Latest Stock Buyback Tax Rules May Still Have Wide Reach

    The U.S. Treasury Department recently floated regulations that narrow an earlier proposal aimed at preventing foreign-parented corporations from circumventing a new excise tax on stock buybacks, but the regulations still characterize avoidance in ways that could include routine intercompany transactions.

  • May 02, 2024

    Wyden Pushes Intuit To Help Users Get Refunds After Error

    The Senate's top tax writer told Intuit's CEO that the company needs to help taxpayers in Oregon, the senator's home state, receive the full refunds they're entitled to after a reported error in its TurboTax product caused some Oregonians to overpay their state taxes.

  • May 02, 2024

    Nixon Peabody Adds Two Community Finance Attys In DC

    Nixon Peabody LLP has hired two partners, who will focus their practices on helping nonprofits and other clients understand and obtain tax credits for a range of community development projects, to its community development finance practice in Washington, D.C., the firm announced Thursday.

  • May 02, 2024

    Feds Want Prison For Ex-Public Defender For Tax Fraud

    A former chief public defender in Minneapolis who in seeking leniency said he resigned in disgrace amid accusations that he failed to pay taxes for years on his private law firm should nonetheless spend eight months in prison after pleading guilty, prosecutors told a Minnesota federal court.

  • May 02, 2024

    Former Mich. Speaker, Wife Arraigned On Embezzling Charges

    A former speaker of the Michigan House of Representatives and his wife pled not guilty on Thursday to multiple financial crimes and received the judge's blessing to travel out of state to attend the Kentucky Derby, in their first court appearance since the charges were announced.  

  • May 01, 2024

    Senate Dems Reintroduce Bill To Tax And Regulate Cannabis

    Senate Democrats on Wednesday reintroduced a cannabis legalization bill that would remove the drug entirely from the ambit of the Controlled Substances Act and impose a tax-and-regulate scheme akin to what is currently in place for alcohol and tobacco.

  • May 01, 2024

    IRS Updates PLR Procedure For Stock Spin-Off Transactions

    The Internal Revenue Service issued updated procedures Wednesday for requesting private letter rulings pertaining to spin-off transactions, including what representations and analysis must accompany the requests.

  • May 01, 2024

    No Relief For Fla. Adviser Convicted In $80M Trading Scam

    The Eleventh Circuit on Wednesday affirmed the conviction of a Florida investment adviser who bilked more than $80 million from the hundreds of people he persuaded to invest in a fraudulent company, after concluding he was not in custody when he made statements to the police.

  • May 01, 2024

    Family Trust Asks Justices To Review $16.2M Tax Row

    A family trust established by grandparents for their five grandchildren asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review a Third Circuit ruling finding the trust was the nominee of an adult son with $16.2 million in tax liabilities, saying the decision stands to upset estate planning norms.

  • May 01, 2024

    7th Circ. Affirms Research Tax Credit Limit For Scoreboard Co.

    A scoreboard maker can't include an executive's compensation in its research tax credit claims, a Seventh Circuit panel ruled, agreeing with the U.S. Tax Court that there was no proof to show how much time he spent on research relevant for the credit.

  • May 01, 2024

    Think Tank Says 'Distortive' DSTs Not The Right Way Forward

    As jurisdictions around the world continue to struggle with how to adequately tax the increasingly digital economy, they should look to expand their consumption taxes, not enact digital services taxes, the Tax Foundation said.

  • May 01, 2024

    Ex-NFL Star Romanowski Files For Ch. 11 Amid $15M Tax Suit

    Ex NFL star and Super Bowl champion Bill Romanowski has filed for Chapter 11 protection in California after being slapped with a $15.5 million income tax suit.

  • May 01, 2024

    Liberty Global Defends $109M Tax Refund Bid In 10th Circ.

    Telecommunications giant Liberty Global urged the Tenth Circuit to revive the company's $109 million tax refund bid, arguing a lower court rejected the claim by wrongly disregarding intercompany transactions that are permitted under legislation involving the repatriation of foreign profits.

  • May 01, 2024

    Metal Biz Owner Cops To Tax Fraud On $2.8M Income

    The owner of a metal fabrication company admitted to neglecting to report nearly $3 million in business income to the IRS, Connecticut federal prosecutors announced.

  • May 01, 2024

    Billionaire Energy Co. Founder Sues Booz Allen Over IRS Leak

    Energy Transfer co-founder Kelcy Warren accused government contractor Booz Allen Hamilton of failing to supervise an employee who stole Warren's private tax information and that of thousands of other wealthy people while on assignment at the IRS, according to a complaint in Maryland federal court.

  • May 01, 2024

    Overtime Theft Scheme Earns Ex-Mass. Trooper 3 Years

    The former second-in-command of a Massachusetts state police traffic safety unit was sentenced to three years in prison for his role in a widespread conspiracy to steal federally funded overtime through no-work shifts.

Expert Analysis

  • What Large Language Models Mean For Document Review

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    Courts often subject parties using technology assisted review to greater scrutiny than parties conducting linear, manual document review, so parties using large language models for document review should expect even more attention, along with a corresponding need for quality control and validation, say attorneys at Sidley.

  • Participating In Living History Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    My role as a baron in a living history group, and my work as volunteer corporate counsel for a book series fan association, has provided me several opportunities to practice in unexpected areas of law — opening doors to experiences that have nurtured invaluable personal and professional skills, says Matthew Parker at the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services.

  • Private Equity Owners Can Remedy Law Firms' Agency Issues

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    Nonlawyer, private-equity ownership of law firms can benefit shareholders and others vulnerable to governance issues such as disparate interests, and can in turn help resolve agency problems, says Michael Di Gennaro at The Law Practice Exchange.

  • Kentucky Tax Talk: Taking Up The Dormant Commerce Clause

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    Attorneys at Frost Brown examine whether the U.S. Supreme Court is likely to review Foresight Coal Sales v. Kent Chandler to consider whether a Kentucky utility rate law discriminates against interstate commerce, and how the decision may affect dormant commerce clause jurisprudence.

  • Prevailing Wage Rules Complicate Inflation Act Tax Incentives

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    Nicole Elliott and Timothy Taylor at Holland & Knight discuss the intersection between tax and labor newly created by the Inflation Reduction Act, and focus on aspects of recent U.S. Department of Labor and U.S. Department of the Treasury rules that may catch tax-incentive seekers off guard.

  • Payroll Tax Evasion Notice Suggests FinCEN's New Focus

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    The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network’s recent notice advising U.S. financial institutions to report payroll tax evasion and workers' compensation schemes in the construction industry suggests a growing interest in tax enforcement and IRS collaboration, as well as increased scrutiny in the construction sector, say Andrew Weiner and Jay Nanavati at Kostelanetz.

  • How Taxpayers Can Prep As Justices Weigh Repatriation Tax

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    The U.S. Supreme Court might strike down the 2017 federal tax overhaul's corporate repatriation tax in Moore v. U.S., so taxpayers should file protective tax refund claims before the case is decided and repatriate previously taxed earnings that could become entangled in dubious potential Section 965 refunds, say Jenny Austin and Gary Wilcox at Mayer Brown.

  • IRS Foreign Tax Credit Pause Is Welcome Course Correction

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    A recent IRS notice temporarily suspending application of 2022 foreign tax credit regulations provides wanted relief for the many U.S. multinational companies and other taxpayers that otherwise face the risk of significant double taxation in their international operations, say attorneys at Mayer Brown.

  • If Justices End Chevron Deference, Auer Could Be Next Target

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    If the U.S. Supreme Court decides next term to overrule its Chevron v. NRDC decision, it may open the door for a similar review of the Auer deference — the principle that a government agency can interpret, through application, ambiguous agency regulations, says Sohan Dasgupta at Taft Stettinius.

  • Tax Court Ruling Provides Helpful Profits Interest Guidance

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    A recent U.S. Tax Court decision holding that a partnership may exclude interests in a company that it indirectly received sheds light on related IRS guidance, including the proper valuation method for such interests, though the court's application of the method to the facts of this case appears flawed, say attorneys at Kramer Levin.

  • Mallory Ruling Doesn't Undermine NC Sales Tax Holding

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    Contrary to the conclusion reached in a recent Law360 guest article, the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent Mallory ruling shouldn't be read as implicitly repudiating the North Carolina Supreme Court’s sales tax ruling in Quad Graphics v. North Carolina Department of Revenue — the U.S. Supreme Court could have rejected Quad by directly overturning it, says Jonathan Entin at Case Western Reserve.

  • IRS Criminal Probe Spells Uncertainty For Malta Pension Plans

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    The IRS’ recent scrutiny of Malta pension plan arrangements — and its unusual issuance of criminal administrative summonses — confirms that it views many of these plans as illegal tax evasion schemes, and the road ahead will not be smooth and steady for anyone involved, say attorneys at Kostelanetz.

  • IRS Announcement Will Aid Cos. In Buyback Tax Planning

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    Recent IRS transitional guidance regarding current requirements for reporting and payment of the stock repurchase excise tax will help corporate taxpayers make decisions about records retention and establishing reserves for future tax payments, say Xenia Garofalo and Kyle Colonna at Eversheds Sutherland.

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