On June 17, 2025, the Tax Court opinion in AbbVie Inc. and Subsidiaries v. Commissioner of Internal Revenue was issued,[1] holding that the approximately $1.6 billion termination fee AbbVie (a Delaware corporation) paid to its abandoned merger partner Shire plc (an Irish company) was properly an ordinary deductible business
The Tax Court in Soroban Holds that Limited Partners Were Too Active To Be Treated As “Limited Partners” and are Subject to Self-Employment Tax
On May 28, 2025, in Soroban Capital Partners LP v. Commissioner (T.C. Memo 2025-52) (“Soroban II”), the Tax Court held the active role of limited partners in a fund manager caused them to fail to qualify as “limited partners” for purposes of section 1402(a)(13) and, therefore, the limited…
IRS and Treasury Announce Withdrawal of Related Party Basis Shifting Regulations
On April 17, 2025, the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (the “IRS”) issued Notice 2025-23 (the “Notice”), announcing its intention to withdraw the recently released final regulations final regulationsthat classify certain partnership related party basis shifting transactions and substantially similar transactions as “transactions of interest”. The Notice provides taxpayers and their…
Final Regulations Issued for Certain Partnership Related Party Basis Adjustment Transactions
Introduction
On January 10, 2025, the Treasury Department and the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (the “IRS”) released final regulations (the “regulations”) classifying certain partnership related party basis adjustment transactions and substantially similar transactions as transactions of interest, a type of reportable transaction, which requires disclosure for the taxpayer and its…
Senators Crapo and Wyden Release Draft Bipartisan Taxpayer Rights Legislation
I. Introduction
On January 30, 2025, Mike Crapo (R-ID), the Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, and Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR), the Ranking Member of the Senate Finance Committee released a discussion draft of the “Taxpayer Assistance and Service Act” (the “bill”), a bipartisan taxpayer rights bill intended…
Tax Proposals Potentially Being Considered by the U.S. House Budget Committee in Reconciliation
On January 17, 2025, multiple news outlets and other sources reported the existence of a memorandum circulated by the U.S. House of Representatives Budget Committee to the House Republican Caucus (the “Memorandum”) containing an extensive list of budget proposals that may be considered in connection with the new Congress’s widely expected budget reconciliation legislation. The Memorandum, which is publicly available via link from a number of news outlets,[1] contains approximately fifty pages of proposals covering a wide range of policy areas and enumerating scores of potential specific legislative proposals (along with estimated budget effects in most cases), some of which are seemingly mutually exclusive. Included in the memo are a number of tax-related proposals, including tariff proposals, which are briefly set forth below.
Trump Administration Disavows the OECD Global Tax Deal
On January 20, 2025, the White House issued a memorandum (the “Memorandum”)[1], announcing that the “Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Global Tax Deal” (the “Global Tax Deal”) has “no force or effect in the United States” and disavowing “any commitments” previously made by the United States…
Tax Court Reaffirmed Soroban’s Holding that Active Limited Partners of State Law Limited Partnerships May Be Subject to Self-Employment Tax
On December 23, 2024, in Denham Capital Management LP v. Commissioner (T.C. Memo. 2024-114), the Tax Court reaffirmed its earlier ruling in Soroban Capital Partners LP v. Commissioner (161 T.C. No. 12.) that active limited partners of a state law limited partnership are not entitled to the “limited partner exception”…
Increase in Tax Audits of Use of Private Aircraft, a/k/a “Corporate Jets”
The IRS has announced a new audit campaign targeted at the use of private aircraft, a/k/a “corporate jets”. This has been an intensifying area of focus by the IRS over the last few years as a result of recently-increased tax benefits for private aircraft. Clients who use airplanes for business…
No Money? No Problem: Recent IRS Favorable Guidance Regarding a REIT’s First Year
On October 4, 2024, the Internal Revenue Service (the “IRS”) released Private Letter Ruling 202440007, which concluded that the lack of income and assets in the first taxable year of an entity that had elected to be treated as a real estate investment trust (“REIT”) did not cause the entity…