Taxpayers with deadlines for making investments into qualified opportunity funds to satisfy the 180-day requirement from April 1 to March 31 now automatically have a March 31 deadline, the Internal Revenue Service said in a notice released Tuesday. The agency in June 2020 initially extended that deadline through the end of 2020 for some investors, allowing them more time to invest gains in qualified opportunity zones and obtain the tax benefits of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act
program.The opportunity zone program is meant to bring monetary investments into lower-income communities to help spur economic development. Opportunity zones allow investors to reinvest capital gains within a 180-day window into designated low-income areas in exchange for certain tax benefits that grow the longer the money is invested in a qualified opportunity fund through Dec. 31, 2026.
The IRS' Tuesday notice extended other types of coronavirus relief, including one for a substantial improvement period for fund property and another for a 90% investment standard for funds.
--Additional reporting by David van den Berg. Editing by Vincent Sherry.
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