Federal
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August 09, 2024
6th Circ. Partially Revives Crypto IRS Reporting Challenge
The Sixth Circuit issued a mixed ruling Friday in a suit brought by a group of cryptocurrency users challenging the IRS' pending mandate to report large crypto transactions, reversing the dismissal of the suit's Fourth and First Amendment violation claims but affirming that some of the case's claims are not ripe.
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August 09, 2024
Partnership Clarity Expected In First Offshore Profits Rules
Tax attorneys anticipate answers to several questions about how partnerships should properly track, report and attribute foreign income previously taxed in the U.S. when the first round of long-awaited proposed rules is published.
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August 09, 2024
3rd Circ. Kicks $1M Case To Tax Court Over IRS Violation
The Third Circuit sent a man's protest of a lien seeking over $1 million in unpaid employee payroll taxes back to the U.S. Tax Court on Friday because the IRS violated an automatic stay on the proceedings triggered by a bankruptcy proceeding.
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August 09, 2024
IRS Wrongly Penalizes For Unreported Inheritance, Court Told
The Internal Revenue Service violated the constitutional rights of a California woman when penalizing her $92,000 for failing to report inheriting $350,000 from a parent who had lived in the U.K., the woman told a federal court.
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August 09, 2024
Israel Resident Says She Was Never Notified Of $9M Tax Debt
The daughter of a dead Brooklyn rabbi was a permanent resident of Israel in the early years of this century and never received IRS notices about $9.2 million in taxes and penalties, she told a New York court Friday in arguing that she doesn't owe the money.
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August 09, 2024
IRS Delays Tax Deadlines In 4 States After Hurricane Debby
Following Hurricane Debby, all South Carolina taxpayers as well as many in Florida, North Carolina and Georgia will now be given until Feb. 3 to file individual and business tax returns and make payments, the Internal Revenue Service said Friday.
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August 09, 2024
Pa. Firm Seeks Over $790K In Employee Retention Credit
The Internal Revenue Service has failed to pay Ostroff Injury Law PC the more than $790,000 it is owed in pandemic-era employee retention credits, the Pennsylvania firm alleges in a federal court complaint, despite satisfying two separate tests the firm says qualify it for the relief.
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August 09, 2024
IRS Direct File To Be Offered In Connecticut Next Year
The Internal Revenue Service's free electronic tax filing program known as Direct File will be available in Connecticut for the 2025 tax filing season, the agency and the U.S. Department of the Treasury announced Friday.
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August 09, 2024
7 Taxpayer Advocacy Panel Committees To Meet In September
Seven Taxpayer Advocacy Panel committees will meet in September to discuss possible improvements to customer services, the Internal Revenue Service said Friday.
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August 09, 2024
IRS Updates Digital Asset Form For Custodial Brokers
The Internal Revenue Service released a revised draft form Friday for brokers to report their digital asset sales, which reflects the treatment of custodial industry participants in final regulations and the transitional relief for filers that fail to report the transactions.
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August 09, 2024
Weekly Internal Revenue Bulletin
The Internal Revenue Service's weekly bulletin, issued Friday, included final regulations that clarify potential situations that could trigger an anti-abuse rule that covers transactions involving foreign corporations.
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August 09, 2024
What Books Tax Pros Recommend For This Summer
As practitioners monitor the tax implications of the U.S. presidential election as well as what might come out of the next European Commission, they may want to take a break with a good book. Here, Law360 takes a look at tax specialists' summer reading recommendations.
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August 09, 2024
Taxation With Representation: Latham, Freshfields, Wachtell
In this week's Taxation With Representation, Quantum Capital Group agrees to a roughly $3 billion deal for Cogentrix Energy, Apax Partners LLP is acquiring Thoughtworks for roughly $1.75 billion, and Mallinckrodt inks a $925 million deal for Therakos.
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August 08, 2024
Cayman Co. Owes Tax On Partners' Income, Tax Court Says
A Cayman Islands partnership is liable for withholding taxes on the share of about $24.8 million in income from its U.S. operations that was allocated to its foreign partners through special purpose vehicles, the U.S. Tax Court said Thursday.
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August 08, 2024
IRS Agents Seek To Join Hunter Biden's Tax Privacy Case
Accusations of wrongdoing against two Internal Revenue Service whistleblowers who said the government downplayed tax fraud allegations against Hunter Biden give the pair standing to intervene in Biden's privacy case against the U.S. government, the men told a federal court.
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August 08, 2024
Feds Seek 2 Years For Accountant In $8M Payroll Tax Scheme
A New Jersey moving company's head accountant should serve a two-year sentence for being the "nerve center" of a nearly $8 million payroll tax scheme, prosecutors told a New York federal judge in a bid to deny the man's request for a noncustodial sentence.
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August 08, 2024
IRS Targeting Up To $5B In Employee Retention Credit Claims
The Internal Revenue Service in recent weeks sent 28,000 rejection letters to businesses to target high-risk employee retention tax credits that could prevent up to $5 billion in improper credit claims, Commissioner Daniel Werfel said Thursday.
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August 08, 2024
5th Circ. Asked To Back Dell Worker's Penalty For Tax Protest
The Fifth Circuit should uphold a U.S. Tax Court ruling that found a Texas man was required to pay income taxes on nearly $300,000 worth of wages he earned from Dell and a penalty for advancing frivolous arguments, the government said Thursday.
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August 08, 2024
Nixon Peabody Hires Community Development Counsel In DC
When Steven Feenstra, the newest member of Nixon Peabody LLP's the community development finance practice, visited a client's office some 25 years ago, the photos of the community housing projects the client had helped develop made a lasting impression on him, he told Law360 Pulse in an interview Thursday.
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August 08, 2024
Cabinet Cos. Say They're Owed $1.35M In Retention Credits
The Internal Revenue Service owes a pair of Arizona-based cabinet manufacturers that operate as a single employer nearly $1.35 million in employee retention tax credits, the companies told an Arizona federal court, adding that the agency has failed to even respond to their claims.
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August 08, 2024
Colo. Couple Settle $3.4M Hardship Refund Case
A Colorado couple hit by a series of economic and personal hardships have reached a settlement with the federal government that will grant the couple a portion of the $3.4 million refund they sought and resolve their case, the two sides told a Colorado federal court.
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August 08, 2024
US Asks 2nd Circ. To Uphold IRS Lien For $4.2M Restitution
The Internal Revenue Service should be allowed to proceed with a lien to collect some $4.2 million in restitution from a man who pled guilty to three counts of tax fraud, the U.S. told the Second Circuit.
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August 07, 2024
Weak Link Doomed $690M Whistleblower Claim, DC Circ. Says
A whistleblower could not get up to $690 million, or 30% of the $2.3 billion collected in an Internal Revenue Service offshore voluntary disclosure program, because the connection between his actions and the program was weak, the D.C. Circuit said Wednesday.
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August 07, 2024
Waste Co. Not Entitled To Audit Records, IRS Tells Court
Garbage-hauling giant Waste Management Inc. is not entitled to the IRS' tax files on the company from 2017, including audit records, because some documents contain return information of third parties, the agency said Wednesday.
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August 07, 2024
5th Circ. Grapples With 'Ridiculous' $100M Arbitration
A Fifth Circuit panel struggled to make sense out of a "ridiculous" arbitration proceeding that produced four contradictory arbitration awards in a legal malpractice dispute, one awarding $100 million, pressing both sides during oral arguments Wednesday to give answers about how the "spectacle" unfolded.
Expert Analysis
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Class Actions At The Circuit Courts: July Lessons
In this month's review of class action appeals, Mitchell Engel at Shook Hardy considers cases touching on pre- and post-conviction detainment conditions, communications with class representatives, when the American Pipe tolling doctrine stops applying to modified classes, and more.
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Now More Than Ever, Lawyers Must Exhibit Professionalism
As society becomes increasingly fractured and workplace incivility is on the rise, attorneys must champion professionalism and lead by example, demonstrating how lawyers can respectfully disagree without being disagreeable, says Edward Casmere at Norton Rose.
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Reading Between The Lines Of Justices' Moore Ruling
The U.S. Supreme Court's recent Moore v. U.S. decision, that the Internal Revenue Code Section 965 did not violate the 16th Amendment, was narrowly tailored to minimally disrupt existing tax regimes, but the justices' various opinions leave the door open to future tax challenges and provide clues for what the battles may look like, say Caroline Ngo and Le Chen at McDermott.
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A Midyear Forecast: Tailwinds Expected For Atty Hourly Rates
Hourly rates for partners, associates and support staff continued to rise in the first half of this year, and this growth shows no signs of slowing for the rest of 2024 and into next year, driven in part by the return of mergers and acquisitions and the widespread adoption of artificial intelligence, says Chuck Chandler at Valeo Partners.
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States Should Loosen Law Firm Ownership Restrictions
Despite growing buzz, normalized nonlawyer ownership of law firms is a distant prospect, so the legal community should focus first on liberalizing state restrictions on attorney and firm purchases of practices, which would bolster succession planning and improve access to justice, says Michael Di Gennaro at The Law Practice Exchange.
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After Chevron: Uniform Tax Law Interpretation Not Guaranteed
The loss of Chevron deference will significantly alter the relationship between the IRS, courts and Congress when it comes to tax law, potentially precipitating more transparent rulemaking, but also provoking greater uncertainty due to variability in judicial interpretation, say Michelle Levin and Carneil Wilson at Dentons.
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Texas Ethics Opinion Flags Hazards Of Unauthorized Practice
The Texas Professional Ethics Committee's recently issued proposed opinion finding that in-house counsel providing legal services to the company's clients constitutes the unauthorized practice of law is a valuable clarification given that a UPL violation — a misdemeanor in most states — carries high stakes, say Hilary Gerzhoy and Julienne Pasichow at HWG.
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How High Court Approached Time Limit On Reg Challenges
The U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Corner Post v. Federal Reserve Board effectively gives new entities their own personal statute of limitations to challenge rules and regulations, and Justice Brett Kavanaugh's concurrence may portend the court's view that those entities do not need to be directly regulated, say attorneys at Snell & Wilmer.
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How To Clean Up Your Generative AI-Produced Legal Drafts
As law firms increasingly rely on generative artificial intelligence tools to produce legal text, attorneys should be on guard for the overuse of cohesive devices in initial drafts, and consider a few editing pointers to clean up AI’s repetitive and choppy outputs, says Ivy Grey at WordRake.
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A Tale Of 2 Trump Cases: The Rule Of Law Is A Live Issue
The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision this week in Trump v. U.S., holding that former President Donald Trump has broad immunity from prosecution, undercuts the rule of law, while the former president’s New York hush money conviction vindicates it in eight key ways, says David Postel at Henein Hutchison.
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Industry Self-Regulation Will Shine Post-Chevron
The U.S. Supreme Court's Loper decision will shape the contours of industry self-regulation in the years to come, providing opportunities for this often-misunderstood practice, says Eric Reicin at BBB National Programs.
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3 Ways Agencies Will Keep Making Law After Chevron
The U.S. Supreme Court clearly thinks it has done something big in overturning the Chevron precedent that had given deference to agencies' statutory interpretations, but regulated parties have to consider how agencies retain significant power to shape the law and its meaning, say attorneys at K&L Gates.
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Atty Well-Being Efforts Ignore Root Causes Of The Problem
The legal industry is engaged in a critical conversation about lawyers' mental health, but current attorney well-being programs primarily focus on helping lawyers cope with the stress of excessive workloads, instead of examining whether this work culture is even fundamentally compatible with lawyer well-being, says Jonathan Baum at Avenir Guild.