October 2018 For months, the American Institute of CPAs (AICPA) and American businesses have been requesting guidance from the U.S. Treasury Department and Internal Revenue Service ("IRS") regarding changes made by the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) (Pub. L. No. 115-97). These changes disallowed the deductibility of entertainment, amusement, recreation and qualified transportation fringe expenses beginning [...]
To maintain accounting records under generally accepted accounting principles, companies need to assess the likelihood of judgmental positions being sustained. The recent tax case United States vs. Textron, No. 06-198T (Aug. 29, 2007), is important in establishing a taxpayer’s right to prevent disclosure of (i) its internal analyses of these controversial tax positions, and (ii) [...]
In Regions Financial Corp. v. United States, (N.D. Ala., No. 2:06-CV-00895-RDP, 5/8/08), the IRS lost another battle in its effort to get information from outside accountants’ tax accrual work papers. This case could be particularly damaging to the IRS’s position because the Court’s rationale arguably would apply regardless of which split in authority is [...]
Updated January 2007 In June 2006, the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) issued FIN 48, an amendment to existing standard no. 109, "Accounting for Income Taxes." At first blush, the pronouncement seems simple, fair, and straightforward, but it will have a huge unintended consequence. The pronouncement requires that, starting in 2007, corporations that took aggressive [...]