Podcast: Discussing and Demystifying the IRS News Release on ESOPs
(A)ESOP's Fables - The Income and Estate Tax-Free ESOP
Investment Management Update – Exit Strategies
ESOPs: A Path to Bank Independence
The Department of the Treasury (“Treasury”) and the Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”), in an April 2024 follow-up to IRS Notice 2023-2, issued proposed regulations dealing with the one-percent excise tax under Internal Revenue...more
Berman v. Comm’r, released on July 16, 2024, is a great example of making lemonade when life hands you a lemon. Although the taxpayers lost the federal income tax deferral of a stock sale to an employee stock ownership plan...more
All qualified retirement plans are subject to a myriad of requirements of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974, as amended (ERISA). The United States Department of Labor (DOL) is charged with enforcing the...more
Business owners considering exit options from their businesses often can be blinded by purchase price figures and proceeds, often “accepting” that paying capital gains tax is part of the deal. The ability to avoid or defer...more
Since their establishment in 1974, Employee Stock Ownership Plans (“ESOPs”) have become a popular and effective mechanism for private companies (both C corporations and S corporations) to provide employees an opportunity to...more
Section 6039 of the Internal Revenue Code requires corporations to provide information statements to employees (including former employees) and information filings to the IRS regarding exercises of incentive stock options...more
The budding cannabis industry, despite its rapid growth and gradual acceptance in recent years, still faces a major sustainability challenge: Cannabis businesses cannot deduct most ordinary business expenses. Under Internal...more
On November 1, 2023, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) released Notice 2023-75, which sets forth the 2024 cost-of-living adjustments affecting dollar limits on benefits and contributions for qualified retirement plans. The...more
Check out our summary of significant Internal Revenue Service (IRS) guidance and relevant tax matters for the week of August 7, 2023 – August 11, 2023....more
The Senate ushered in the New Year with a bang by passing SECURE 2.0 on December 22, 2022. SECURE 2.0 includes many updates to the sweeping changes brought about under 2019’s original SECURE Act legislation. The following are...more
The “Great Resignation” of 2021 and the low unemployment rates in the first half of 2022 have caused businesses to increase their focus on employee retention. What options do companies have to attract and retain employees in...more
If the pandemic was good for anything, it was TV watching. The pandemic may become known as the golden age of television. Since I was a foreign language major (Portuguese and Spanish) at West Point (mind you out of academic...more
Sharing equity (ownership) in a business with employees is not a novel concept. Entrepreneurs have been sharing equity with their employees for decades, but equity sharing has become more popular over the last two decades,...more
The Tax Court’s recent decision in Larson v. Commissioner involved a frequent tax issue in the context of S corporations and control persons: Whether restricted stock of an S-corporation contributed to an employee stock...more
Freeman Law’s “The Tax Court in Brief” covers every substantive Tax Court opinion, providing a weekly brief of its decisions in clear, concise prose....more
On November 4, 2021, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) released the 2022 dollar limitations that apply to tax-qualified retirement plans. With few exceptions, the 2022 limitations published in Notice 2021-61 have been...more
Today the IRS announced in Notice 2021-61 the cost of living adjustments affecting dollar limitations for pension plans and other retirement-related items for tax year 2022 under the Internal Revenue Code. Nearly every...more
An employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) is a type of tax-qualified retirement plan. ESOPs are designed to invest primarily in qualifying employer securities, as defined in applicable tax rules....more
As a business owner, you care about your business, your employees, and your customers. Deeply. And as a parent, grandparent, spouse or sibling, you care about your family. But when it comes time to transition your business,...more
The Internal Revenue Code requires plan administrators of qualified retirement plans (e.g., 401(k) plans, defined benefit plans and ESOPs), 403(b) plans, and eligible 457(b) plans maintained by a governmental employer to...more
The IRS Office of Chief Counsel on Dec. 20, 2019, released a so-called Generic Legal Advice Memorandum (GLAM) that had been issued to Division Counsel within the IRS Tax Exempt and Government Entities Division. A GLAM is not...more
Generally, for a tax qualified retirement plan to be adopted, the plan document must be signed and dated by the sponsoring employer and retained. However, in Val Lanes Recreation Center Corp. v. Commissioner of Internal...more
On November 6, 2019, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) released Notice 2019-59, which sets forth the 2020 cost-of-living adjustments affecting dollar limits on benefits and contributions for qualified retirement plans. The...more
The Commissioner of Internal Revenue announced the 2020 dollar limitations for benefits and contributions that apply to retirement plans. Most limits have increased, while a few remained the same. The Social Security...more
In one of its Issue Snapshots, the IRS recently focused on methods for preventing the occurrence of an ESOP “nonallocation year” under IRC section 409(p). Issue Shapshots are not precedential IRS guidance, but are research...more