Financial Guides Archive - Private Tax Solutions

02 Aug 2024

This Financial Guide provides tax saving strategies for deferring income and maximizing deductions and includes some strategies for specific categories of individuals, such as those with high income and those who are self-employed.

Before getting into the specifics, however, we would like to stress the importance of proper documentation. Many taxpayers forgo valuable tax deductions because they haven’t kept receipts or other records. Not only are adequate records required by the IRS, but neglecting to track deductible expenses throughout the year can lead to overlooking them. You also need to maintain records regarding your income. If you receive a large tax-free amount, such as a gift or inheritance, make certain to document the item so that the IRS does not later claim that you had unreported income.

The checklist items listed below are for general information only and should be tailored to your specific situation. If you think one of them fits your tax situation, we’d be happy to discuss it with you.

Defer Income Recognition
Max Out Your 401(k) or Similar Employer Plan
If You Have Your Own Business, Set Up and Contribute to a Retirement Plan
Contribute to an IRA
Defer Bonuses or Other Earned Income
Accelerate Capital Losses and Defer Capital Gains
Watch Trading Activity in Your Portfolio
Use the Gift Tax Annual Exclusion to Shift Income
Invest in Treasury Securities
Consider Tax-Exempt Municipal Bonds
Give Appreciated Assets to Charity
Keep Track of Mileage Driven for Business, Medical or Charitable Purposes
Contribute to a Pre-tax Account to Fund Medical Expenses
Check Out Separate Filing Status
If Self-Employed, Take Advantage of Special Deductions
If Self-Employed, Hire Your Child in the Business

Defer Income Recognition

Most individuals are in a higher tax bracket in their working years than they are during retirement, so using tax-advantaged retirement accounts to defer income until retirement can reduce your current-year taxes plus may ultimately result in paying taxes on that income at a lower rate. Additionally, you may be able to invest the money you would have otherwise paid in taxes to increase the amount of your retirement fund. Deferral can also work in the short term if you expect to be in a lower bracket in the following year or if you can take advantage of lower long-term capital gains rates by holding an asset a little longer.

Another way to use timing to reduce your current-year taxes is to accelerate deductions, for example, by paying a state estimated tax installment in December instead of at the following January due date. But be mindful of the $10,000 ($5,000 if you’re married filing separately) annual limit on the deduction for state and local taxes, which through 2025 applies to the combined amount of property taxes and income or sales tax.

Max Out Your 401(k) or Similar Employer Plan

Many employers offer plans where you can elect to defer a portion of your pay by contributing it to a tax-deferred retirement account. For many companies, these are 401(k) plans. For nonprofit employers, such as universities, a similar plan called a 403(b) is available. If your employer offers such a retirement plan, contribute as much as possible to defer income and accumulate retirement assets.

Some employers match a portion of employee contributions to such plans. If this is available, you should structure your contributions to receive the maximum employer matching contribution.

If You Have Your Own Business, Set Up and Contribute to a Retirement Plan

If you have your own business, consider setting up and contributing as much as possible to a retirement plan. These are allowed even for a sideline or moonlighting business. Several types of plans are available which minimize the paperwork involved in establishing and administering such a plan.

Related Guide: For details on retirement plans benefiting self-employed owners, see the Financial Guide: EMPLOYEE BENEFITS: How To Handle Them.

Contribute to an IRA

If you have income from wages or self-employment income, you can build tax-sheltered investments by contributing to a traditional or a Roth IRA. You may also be able to contribute to a spousal IRA even if the spouse has little or no earned income. All IRAs defer the taxation of IRA investment income and in some cases contributions may be deductible or be withdrawn tax-free.

Related Guide: For details on how Roth IRAs work and how they compare in other respects with traditional IRAs, please see the Financial Guide: ROTH IRAs: How They Work and How To Use Them.

To get the most from IRA contributions, fund the IRA as early as possible in the year. Also, pay the IRA trustee out of separate funds, not out of the amount in the IRA. Following these two rules will help ensure that you get the most tax-deferred earnings possible from your money.

Defer Bonuses or Other Earned Income

If you are due a bonus at year-end, you may be able to defer receipt of these funds until January. This can defer the payment of taxes (other than the portion withheld) for another year. If you’re self-employed, defer sending invoices or bills to clients or customers until after the new year begins. Here, too, you can defer some of the tax, subject to estimated tax requirements. This may even permanently save taxes if you are in a lower tax bracket in the following year. Be advised, however, that the amount subject to Social Security or self-employment tax increases each year.

Accelerate Capital Losses and Defer Capital Gains

If you have investments on which you have an accumulated loss, it may be advantageous to sell it prior to year-end. Capital losses are deductible up to the amount of your capital gains plus $3,000. If you are planning on selling an investment on which you have an accumulated gain, it may be best to wait until after the end of the year to defer payment of the taxes for another year (subject to estimated tax requirements). For most capital assets held more than 12 months (long-term capital gains) the maximum capital gains tax is 20 percent. However, make sure to consider the investment potential of the asset. It may be wise to hold the asset to maximize the economic gain or sell it to minimize the economic loss.

Watch Trading Activity in Your Portfolio

When your mutual fund manager sells stock at a gain, these gains pass through to you as realized taxable gains, even though you don’t withdraw them. So you may prefer a fund with low turnover, assuming satisfactory investment management. Turnover isn’t a tax consideration in tax-sheltered funds such as IRAs or 401(k)s. For growth stocks you invest in directly and hold for the long term, you pay no tax on the appreciation until you sell them. No capital gains tax is imposed on appreciation at your death.

Use the Gift Tax Annual Exclusion to Shift Income

You can give away $18,000 ($36,000 if joined by a spouse) per donee in 2024 without owing federal gift tax or using up any of your lifetime gift and estate tax exemption. You can make these annual exclusion gifts to as many donees as you like. While these transfers are not taxable, any income earned on these gifts after the transfer will be taxed at the donee’s tax rate, which in many cases is lower.

Special rules apply to children subject to the “kiddie tax.” Also, if you directly pay the medical or educational expenses of the donee, such gifts will not be subject to gift tax.

Invest in Treasury Securities

For high-income taxpayers who live in high-income-tax states, investing in Treasury bills, bonds, and notes can pay off in tax savings. The interest on Treasuries is exempt from state and local income tax. Also, investing in Treasury bills that mature in the next tax year results in a deferral of the tax until the next year.

Consider Tax-Exempt Municipal Bonds

Interest on state or local municipal bonds is generally exempt from federal income tax and from tax by the issuing state or locality. For that reason, interest paid on such bonds is somewhat less than that paid on commercial bonds of comparable quality. However, for individuals in higher brackets, the after-tax return from municipal bonds will often be greater than that from higher-interest commercial bonds. Gain on sale of municipal bonds is taxable and loss is deductible. Tax-exempt interest is sometimes an element in the computation of other tax items. Interest on loans to buy or carry tax-exempts is non-deductible.

Give Appreciated Assets to Charity

If you’re planning to make a charitable gift, it generally makes more sense to give appreciated long-term capital assets to the charity than to sell the assets and give the charity the after-tax proceeds. Donating the assets instead of the cash prevents your having to pay capital gains tax on the sale, which can result in considerable savings, depending on your tax bracket and the amount of tax that would be due on the sale. Additionally, you can obtain a tax deduction for the fair market value of the donated assets, assuming you itemize deductions.

Many taxpayers also give depreciated assets to charity. The deduction is for fair market value; no loss deduction is allowed for depreciation in value of a personal asset. Depending on the item donated, there may be strict valuation rules and deduction limits.

Keep Track of Mileage Driven for Business, Medical or Charitable Purposes

If you drive your car for business, medical or charitable purposes, you may be entitled to a deduction for miles driven. For 2024, it’s 67 cents per mile for business, 21 cents for medical and moving purposes (members of the armed forces only for tax years 2018-2025), and 14 cents for service for charitable organizations. To substantiate the deduction, you need to keep detailed daily records of the mileage driven for these purposes.

From 2018 through 2025, employees who drive their own cars for business can’t deduct such expenses. This is due to the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 (TCJA) suspension of miscellaneous itemized deductions subject to the 2% of adjusted gross income floor. This means that, generally, only businesses and the self-employed can claim a deduction for business miles driven.

Contribute to a Pre-tax Account to Fund Medical Expenses

Medical and dental expenses are generally deductible only if you itemize and only to the extent they exceed 7.5 percent of your adjusted gross income (AGI). For most individuals, particularly those with high incomes, this eliminates the possibility of a deduction. You can get a tax benefit similar to a deduction if your employer offers a Flexible Spending Account, sometimes called a cafeteria plan. You can redirect a portion of your compensation to the account to pay these types of expenses with pretax dollars. Another such arrangement is a Health Savings Account (HSA), though it’s available only if you have a high-deductible health plan (HDHP). Self-employed with an HDHP? You can set up an HSA for yourself and make tax deductible contributions to it.

Check Out Separate Filing Status

Certain married couples may benefit from filing separately instead of jointly. Consider filing separately if you meet the following criteria:

One spouse has large medical expenses, and
You and your spouse’s incomes are about equal.

Separate filing may benefit such couples because the adjusted gross income “floors” for taking the medical expense deduction will be computed separately. On the other hand, some tax benefits are denied to couples filing separately. In some states, filing separately can also save a significant amount of state income taxes.

If Self-Employed, Take Advantage of Special Deductions

You may be able to expense up to $1,220,000 in 2024 for qualified equipment purchases for use in your business immediately instead of writing it off over many years. Additionally, self-employed individuals can deduct 100 percent of their health insurance premiums as business expenses. You may also be able to establish a SEP or SIMPLE IRA plan, or a Health Savings Account, as mentioned above.

If Self-Employed, Hire Your Child in the Business

If your child is under age 18, he or she is not subject to employment taxes from your unincorporated business (income taxes still apply). This will reduce your income for both income and employment tax purposes and shift income to the child at the same time; however, you cannot hire your child if he or she is under the age of 8 years old.

by Donald Hayden

02 Aug 2024

According to the US Small Business Administration, small businesses employ half of all private-sector employees in the United States. However, a majority of small businesses do not offer their workers retirement savings benefits.

If you’re like many other small business owners in the United States, you may be considering the various retirement plan options available for your company. Employer-sponsored retirement plans have become a key component for retirement savings. They are also an increasingly important tool for attracting and retaining the high-quality employees you need to compete in today’s competitive environment.

Besides helping employees save for the future, however, instituting a retirement plan can provide you, as the employer, with benefits that enable you to make the most of your business’s assets. Such benefits include:

Tax-deferred growth on earnings within the plan
Current tax savings on individual contributions to the plan
Immediate tax deductions for employer contributions
Easy to establish and maintain
Low-cost benefit with a highly-perceived value by your employees

Types of Plans

Most private sector retirement plans are either defined benefit plans or defined contribution plans. Defined benefit plans are designed to provide a desired retirement benefit for each participant. This type of plan can allow for a rapid accumulation of assets over a short period of time. The required contribution is actuarially determined each year, based on factors such as age, years of employment, the desired retirement benefit, and the value of plan assets. Contributions are generally required each year and can vary widely.

A defined contribution plan, on the other hand, does not promise a specific amount of benefit at retirement. In these plans, employees or their employer (or both) contribute to employees’ individual accounts under the plan, sometimes at a set rate (such as 5 percent of salary annually). A 401(k) plan is one type of defined contribution plan. Other types of defined contribution plans include profit-sharing plans, money purchase plans, and employee stock ownership plans.

Small businesses may choose to offer a defined benefit plan or any of these defined contribution plans. Many financial institutions and pension practitioners make available both defined benefit and defined contribution “prototype” plans that have been pre-approved by the IRS. When such a plan meets the requirements of the tax code it is said to be qualified and will receive four significant tax benefits.

The income generated by the plan assets is not subject to income tax because the income is earned and managed within the framework of a tax-exempt trust.
An employer is entitled to a current tax deduction for contributions to the plan.
The plan participants (the employees or their beneficiaries) do not have to pay income tax on the amounts contributed on their behalf until the year the funds are distributed to them by the employer.
Under the right circumstances, beneficiaries of qualified plan distributors are afforded special tax treatment.

It is necessary to note that all retirement plans have important tax, business and other implications for employers and employees. Therefore, you should discuss any retirement savings plan that you consider implementing with your accountant or financial advisor.

Here’s a brief look at some plans that can help you and your employees save.

SIMPLE: Savings Incentive Match Plan

A SIMPLE IRA plan allows employees to contribute a percentage of their salary each paycheck and to have their employer match their contribution. Under SIMPLE IRA plans, employees can set aside up to $15,500 in 2023 ($14,000 in 2022) by payroll deduction. If the employee is 50 or older then they may contribute an additional $3,500. Employers can either match employee contributions dollar for dollar – up to 3 percent of an employee’s wage – or make a fixed contribution of two percent of pay for all eligible employees instead of a matching contribution.

SIMPLE IRA plans are easy to set up by filling out a short form. Administrative costs are low and much of the paperwork is done by the financial institution that handles the SIMPLE IRA plan accounts. Employers may choose either to permit employees to select the IRA to which their contributions will be sent or to send contributions for all employees to one financial institution. Employees are 100 percent vested in contributions, get to decide how and where the money will be invested, and keep their IRA accounts even when they change jobs.

SEP: Simplified Employee Pension Plan

A SEP plan allows employers to set up a type of individual retirement account – known as a SEP IRA – for themselves and their employees. Employers must contribute a uniform percentage of pay for each employee. Employer contributions are limited to whichever is less: 25 percent of an employee’s annual salary or $66,000 in 2023 (up from $61,000 in 2022). SEP plans can be started by most employers, including those that are self-employed.

SEP plans have low start-up and operating costs and can be established using a single quarter-page form. Businesses are not locked into making contributions every year. You can decide how much to put into a SEP IRA each year – offering you some flexibility when business conditions vary.

401(k) Plans

401(k) plans have become a widely accepted savings vehicle for small businesses and allow employees to contribute a portion of their own incomes toward their retirement. The employee contributions, not to exceed $22,500 in 2023 ($20,500 in 2022), reduce a participant’s pay before income taxes, so that pretax dollars are invested. If the employee is 50 or older then they may contribute another $7,500 in 2023. Employers may offer to match a certain percentage of the employee’s contribution, increasing participation in the plan.

While more complex, 401(k)plans offer higher contribution limits than SIMPLE IRA plans and IRAs, allowing employees to accumulate greater savings.

Profit-Sharing Plans

Employers also may make profit-sharing contributions to plans that are unrelated to any amounts an employee chooses to contribute. Profit-sharing Plans are well suited for businesses with uncertain or fluctuating profits. In addition to the flexibility in deciding the amounts of the contributions, a Profit-Sharing Plan can include options such as service requirements, vesting schedules and plan loans that are not available under SEP plans.

Contributions may range from 0 to 25 percent of eligible employees’ compensation, to a maximum of $66,000 in 2023 (up from $61,000 in 2022) per employee. The contribution in any one year cannot exceed 25 percent of the total compensation of the employees participating in the plan. Contributions need not be the same percentage for all employees. Key employees may actually get as much as 25 percent while others may get as little as three percent. A plan may combine these profit-sharing contributions with 401(k) contributions (and matching contributions).

Your Goals for a Retirement Plan

Business owners set up retirement plans for different reasons. Why are you considering one? Do you want to:

Take advantage of the tax breaks, to save more money than you’d otherwise be able to?
Provide competitive benefits in addition to – or in lieu of – high pay to employees?
Primarily save for your own retirement?

You might say “all of the above.” Small employers who want to set up retirement plans generally fall into one of two groups. The first group includes those who want to set up a retirement plan primarily because they want to create a tax-advantage savings vehicle for themselves and thus want to allocate the greatest possible part of the contribution to the owners. The second group includes those who just want a low-cost, simple retirement plan for employees.

If there were one plan that was most efficient in doing all these things, there wouldn’t be so many choices. That’s why it’s so important to know what your goal is. Each type of plan has different advantages and disadvantages, and you can’t really pick the best ones unless you know what your real purpose is in offering a plan. Once you have an idea of what your motives are, you’re in a better position to weigh the alternatives and make the right pension choice.

If you do decide that you want to offer a retirement plan, then you are definitely going to need some professional advice and guidance. Pension rules are complex and the tax aspects of retirement plans can also be confusing. Make sure you confer with your accountant before deciding which plan is right for you and your employees.

by Donald Hayden

02 Aug 2024

How would you like to legally deduct every dime you spend on vacation this year? This financial guide offers strategies that help you do just that.

Tim, who owns his own business, decided he wanted to take a two-week trip around the US. So he did – and was able to legally deduct every dime that he spent on his “vacation.” Here’s how he did it.

1. Make all your business appointments before you leave for your trip.
Most people believe that they can go on vacation and simply hand out their business cards in order to make the trip deductible.

Wrong.

You must have at least one business appointment before you leave in order to establish the “prior set business purpose” required by the IRS. Keeping this in mind, before he left for his trip, Tim set up appointments with business colleagues in the various cities that he planned to visit.

Let’s say Tim is a manufacturer of green office products looking to expand his business and distribute more product. One possible way to establish business contacts – if he doesn’t already have them – is to place advertisements looking for distributors in newspapers in each location he plans to visit. He could then interview those who respond when he gets to the business destination.

Tim wants to vacation in Hawaii. If he places several advertisements for distributors, or contacts some of his downline distributors to perform a presentation, then the IRS would accept his trip for business.

It would be vital for Tim to document this business purpose by keeping a copy of the advertisement and all correspondence along with noting what appointments he will have in his diary.

2. Make Sure your Trip is All “Business Travel.”
In order to deduct all of your on-the-road business expenses, you must be traveling on business. The IRS states that travel expenses are 100 percent deductible as long as your trip is business related and you are traveling away from your regular place of business longer than an ordinary day’s work and you need to sleep or rest to meet the demands of your work while away from home.

Tim wanted to go to a regional meeting in Boston, which is only a one-hour drive from his home. If he were to sleep in the hotel where the meeting will be held (in order to avoid possible automobile and traffic problems), his overnight stay qualifies as business travel in the eyes of the IRS.

Remember: You don’t need to live far away to be on business travel. If you have a good reason for sleeping at your destination, you could live a couple of miles away and still be on travel status.

3. Make sure that you deduct all of your on-the-road-expenses for each day you’re away.
For every day you are on business travel, you can deduct 100 percent of lodging, tips, car rentals, and 50 percent of your food. Tim spends three days meeting with potential distributors. If he spends $50 a day for food, he can deduct 50 percent of this amount, or $25. The IRS doesn’t require receipts for travel expense under $75 per expense – except for lodging.

For 2021 and 2022 only, business-related meals purchased from a restaurant (for eat-in or take-out) are deductible at 100 percent.

Let’s look at an example:

If Tim pays $6 for drinks on the plane, $6.95 for breakfast, $12.00 for lunch, $50 for dinner, he does not need receipts for anything since each item was under $75. He would, however, need to document these items in a diary. A good tax diary is essential in order to audit-proof your records. Adequate documentation shall consist of amount, date, place and business reason for the expense.

If, however, Tim stays in the Bates Motel and spends $22 on lodging, will he need a receipt? The answer is yes. You need receipts for all paid lodging.

Not only are your on-the-road expenses deductible from your trip, but also all laundry, shoe shines, manicures, and dry-cleaning costs for clothes worn on the trip. Thus, your first dry cleaning bill that you incur when you get home will be fully deductible. Make sure that you keep the dry cleaning receipt and have your clothing dry cleaned within a day or two of getting home.

4. Sandwich weekends between business days.
If you have a business day on Friday and another one on Monday, you can deduct all on-the-road expenses during the weekend.

Tim makes business appointments in Florida on Friday and one on the following Monday. Even though he has no business on Saturday and Sunday, he may deduct on-the-road business expenses incurred during the weekend.

5. Make the majority of your trip days business days.
The IRS says that you can deduct transportation expenses if business is the primary purpose of the trip. A majority of days in the trip must be for business activities, otherwise, you cannot make any transportation deductions.

Tim spends six days in San Diego. He leaves early on Thursday morning. He had a seminar on Friday and meets with distributors on Monday and flies home on Tuesday, taking the last flight of the day home after playing a complete round of golf. How many days are considered business days?

All of them. Thursday is a business day since it includes traveling – even if the rest of the day is spent at the beach. Friday is a business day because he had a seminar. Monday is a business day because he met with prospects and distributors in pre-arranged appointments. Saturday and Sunday are sandwiched between business days, so they count, and Tuesday is a travel day.

Since Tim accrued six business days, he could spend another five days having fun and still deduct all his transportation to San Diego. The reason is that the majority of the days were business days (six out of eleven). However, he can only deduct six days worth of lodging, dry cleaning, shoe shines, and tips. The important point is that Tim would be spending money on lodging, airfare, and food, but now most of his expenses will become deductible.

With proper planning, you can deduct most of your vacations if you combine them with business. Bon Voyage!

by Donald Hayden

02 Aug 2024

Under the IRS rules, a taxpayer is allowed to deduct expenses related to business use of a home, but only if the space is used “exclusively” on a “regular basis.” To qualify for a home office deduction you must meet one of the following requirements:

Exclusive and regular use as your principal place of business
A place for meeting with clients or customers in the ordinary course of business
A place for the taxpayer to perform administrative or management activities associated with the business, provided there is no other fixed location from which the taxpayer conducts a substantial amount of such administrative or management activities

A separate structure not attached to your dwelling unit that is used regularly and exclusively for your trade or profession also qualifies as a home office under the IRS definition.

The exclusive-use test is satisfied if a specific portion of the taxpayer’s home is used solely for business purposes or inventory storage. The regular-basis test is satisfied if the space is used on a continuing basis for business purposes. Incidental business use does not qualify.

In determining the principal place of business, the IRS considers two factors: Does the taxpayer spend more business-related time in the home office than anywhere else? Are the most significant revenue-generating activities performed in the home office? Both of these factors must be considered when determining the principal place of business.

Employees

Tax reform legislation passed in 2017 repealed certain itemized deductions on Schedule A, Itemized Deductions for tax years 2018 through 2025, including employee business expense deductions related to home office use.

For tax years prior to 2018, employees could claim home office expenses as deductions provided they met additional rules such as business use must also be for the convenience of the employer (not just the employee). To qualify for the home-office deduction, an employee must satisfy two additional criteria.

First, the use of the home office must be for the convenience of the employer (for example, the employer does not provide a space for the employee to do his/her job). Second, the taxpayer does not rent all or part of the home to the employer and use the rented portion to perform services as an employee for the employer. Employees who telecommute may be able to satisfy the requirements for the home-office deduction.

To qualify for the home-office deduction, an employee must satisfy two additional criteria. First, the use of the home office must be for the convenience of the employer (for example, the employer does not provide a space for the employee to do his/her job). Second, the taxpayer does not rent all or part of the home to the employer and use the rented portion to perform services as an employee for the employer. Employees who telecommute may be able to satisfy the requirements for the home-office deduction.

Expenses
Home office expenses are classified into three categories:

Direct Business Expenses relate to expenses incurred for the business part of your home such as additional phone lines, long-distance calls, and optional phone services. Basic local telephone service charges (that is, monthly access charges) for the first phone line in the residence generally do not qualify for the deduction.

Indirect Business Expenses are expenditures that are related to running your home such as mortgage or rent, insurance, real estate taxes, utilities, and repairs.

Unrelated Expenses such as painting a room that is not used for business or lawn care are not deductible.

Deduction Limit

You can deduct all your business expenses related to the use of your home if your gross income from the business use of your home equals or exceeds your total business expenses (including depreciation). But, if your gross income from the business use of your home is less than your total business expenses, your deduction for certain expenses for the business use of your home is limited.

Nondeductible expenses such as insurance, utilities, and depreciation that are allocable to the business are limited to the gross income from the business use of your home minus the sum of the following:

The business part of expenses you could deduct even if you did not use your home for business (such as mortgage interest, real estate taxes, and casualty and theft losses that are allowable as itemized deductions on Schedule A (Form 1040)). These expenses are discussed in detail under Deducting Expenses, later.
The business expenses that relate to the business activity in the home (for example, business phone, supplies, and depreciation on equipment), but not to the use of the home itself.

If your deductions are greater than the current year’s limit, you can carry over the excess to the next year. They are subject to the deduction limit for that year, whether or not you live in the same home during that year.

Sale of Residence
If you use property partly as a home and partly for business, tax rules generally permit a $500,000 (married filing jointly) or $250,000 (single or married filing separately) exclusion on the gain from the sale of a primary residence provided certain ownership and use tests are met during the 5-year period ending on the date of the sale:

You owned the home for at least 2 years (ownership test), and
You lived in the home as your main home for at least 2 years (use test).

If the part of your property used for business is within your home, such as a room used as a home office for a business there is no need to allocate gain on the sale of the property between the business part of the property and the part used as a home. However, if you used part of your property as a home and a separate part of it, such as an outbuilding, for business other rules apply such as whether the use test was met (or not met) for the business part and whether or not there was business use in the year of the sale.

If you need more information about whether you qualify for the exclusion, please don’t hesitate to call us.

Simplified Home Office Deduction

If you’re one of the more than 3.4 million taxpayers claimed deductions for business use of a home (commonly referred to as the home office deduction), don’t forget about the new simplified option available for taxpayers starting with 2013 tax returns. Taxpayers claiming the optional deduction will complete a significantly simplified form.

The new optional deduction is capped at $1,500 per year based on $5 a square foot for up to 300 square feet. Though homeowners using the new option cannot depreciate the portion of their home used in a trade or business, they can claim allowable mortgage interest, real estate taxes and casualty losses on the home as itemized deductions on Schedule A. These deductions need not be allocated between personal and business use, as is required under the regular method. Business expenses unrelated to the home, such as advertising, supplies and wages paid to employees are still fully deductible.

Current restrictions on the home office deduction, such as the requirement that a home office must be used regularly and exclusively for business and the limit tied to the income derived from the particular business, still apply under the new option.

Tax Deductions
The “home office” tax deduction is valuable because it converts a portion of otherwise nondeductible expenses such as mortgage, rent, utilities and homeowners insurance into a deduction.

Remember however, that an individual is not entitled to deduct any expenses of using his/her home for business purposes unless the space is used exclusively on a regular basis as the “principal place of business” as defined above. The IRS applies a 2-part test to determine if the home office is the principal place of business.

Do you spend more business-related time in your home office than anywhere else?
Are the most significant revenue-generating activities performed in your home office?

If the answer to either of these questions is no, the home office will not be considered the principal place of business, and the deduction cannot be taken.

A home office also increases your business miles because travel from your home office to a business destination–whether it’s meeting clients, picking up supplies, or visiting a job site–counts as business miles. And, you can depreciate furniture and equipment (purchased new for your business or converted to business use), as well as expense new equipment used in your business under the Section 179 expense election.

Taxpayers taking a deduction for business use of their home must complete Form 8829. If you have a home office or are considering one, please call us. We’ll be happy to help you take advantage of these deductions.

by Donald Hayden

02 Aug 2024

1. IRA Funding Trick
2. Determine the “Best“ Retirement Plan Option
3. Make Your Landlord Pay for Improvements
4. Deduct Home Entertainment Expenses
5. Deduct Holiday Gifts Without Receipts
6. Deduct Your Home Computer.
7. Have Your Company Buy You Dinner

1. IRA Funding Trick

If you don’t have enough cash to make a deductible contribution to your IRA by April 15th, here is how you can still take the tax deduction for that tax year. To get started, all you need is an existing IRA.

Begin by having $6,000 distributed to you from your IRA. Once you have the $6,000, immediately deposit it back into your IRA. If you do this before April 15th, this counts as your deductible contribution for the year. The best part of this is that you have 60 days to “make up” the $6,000 withdrawal (and avoid penalties and taxes). To do this, simply deposit a $6,000 “rollback” into the same IRA account within 60 days and you will be able to avoid taxes and penalties on the original $6,000 distribution made to you.

This is a type of short-term loan from your IRA to make this year’s deductible contribution before the April 15th due date; however, you can only do this once in a 12-month period. If you don’t replace the money within 60 days, you may owe income tax and a 10 percent withdrawal penalty if you’re under the age of 59 1/2.

A 2014 Tax Court opinion, Bobrow v. Commissioner, T.C. Memo. 2014-21 held that the limitation applies on an aggregate basis, meaning that an individual could not make an IRA-to-IRA rollover if he or she had made such a rollover involving any of the individual’s IRAs in the preceding 1-year period. The IRS issued a revised regulation regarding this decision, which became effective on January 1, 2015.

The ability of an IRA owner to transfer funds from one IRA trustee directly to another is not affected because such a transfer is not a rollover and, therefore, is not subject to the one-rollover-per-year limitation.

2. Determine the “Best“ Retirement Plan Option

As a self-employed small business owner, there are several retirement plan options available to you, but understanding which option is most advantageous to you can be confusing. The “best” option for you may depend on whether you have employees and how much you want to save each year.

There are four basic types of plans:

Traditional and Roth IRAS
Simplified Employee Pension (SEP) Plan and Savings Incentive Match Plan for Employees (SIMPLE)
Self-employed 401(k)
Qualified and Defined Benefit Plans

To make sure you are getting the most out of your financial future, contact the office to determine your eligibility and to figure out which plan is best for your tax situation.

3. Make Your Landlord Pay for Improvements

Instead of paying for leasehold improvements at your place of business, you can ask your landlord to pay for them. In return, you offer to pay your landlord more in rent over the term of the lease. By financing your leasehold improvements this way, both you and your landlord can save money on taxes.

Under the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 (i.e., tax reform), qualified leasehold improvement was superseded by qualified improvement property (QIP). Ordinarily, you must deduct the cost of qualified improvements made to your place of business over a 39-year period (similar to that of depreciating real estate); however, up to $1,000,000 in qualified leasehold (as well as restaurant and retail) improvements can be expensed using the Section 179 deduction (subject to certain rules), thanks to tax reform legislation passed in late 2017. Improvements must be interior, that is, roof HVAC systems, façade work and other exterior improvements such as on the roof do not qualify.

Per the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES Act), Qualified Improvements to Property placed in service after 2017 are allowed over a 15-year period (vs. 39 years). In most cases, post-2017 QIP retroactively qualifies for the bonus depreciation deduction as well.

The PATH Act changed the definition of qualified property from qualified leasehold improvements to qualified improvement property. The rules regarding qualified improvement property differ from those for qualified leasehold improvement property in that the improvement does not have to be made pursuant to a lease and does not have to be made to a building more than three years old. For tax years 2016 and 2017, the rules still apply for defining qualified leasehold improvements. In addition, the 15-year recovery period for leasehold, retail, and restaurant improvements was made permanent by the PATH Act as well.

Qualified leasehold improvements completed before 2008 were eligible for a special 15-year recovery period. If in the year your lease term ends you move to another location, you can deduct the portion of the improvement cost that you have not previously deducted. This normal scenario won’t save you tax in the earlier years of the lease. Your landlord will have to put up the initial cash for the improvements, but you will cover that over time with increased payments in your rent. Since your landlord will be paying for the improvements, you will save tax early in the lease and your landlord will benefit as well!

At the same time, your landlord will gain depreciation deductions for the cost of the leasehold improvements. When you leave, your landlord will still have the improved property to offer other future tenants. It is a great opportunity for a win-win situation giving you faster access to invested monies.

4. Deduct Home Entertainment Expenses

If you host a company picnic or holiday party at your home, then the cost of meals at your home is a deductible expense and you can deduct 100% of your meal expenses. However, under tax reform, and starting in 2018, entertainment-related expenses are no longer deductible.

Prior to tax reform, 50 percent of your business-related entertainment expenses (with some exceptions) were generally deductible.

5. Deduct Holiday Gifts Without Receipts

Don’t overlook the deductible benefit of business gifts during the holidays or at any other time of the year. Whether you are a rank-and-file employee, a self-employed individual, or even a shareholder-employee in your own corporation, you can deduct the cost of gifts made to clients and other business associates as a business expense. The law limits your maximum deduction to $25 in value for each recipient for which the gift was purchased with cash.

6. Deduct Your Home Computer.

Tax reform legislation passed in 2017 repealed certain itemized deductions on Schedule A, Itemized Deductions for tax years 2018 through 2025, including employee business expense deductions related to home office use. Prior to 2018, If you purchased a computer and used it for work-related purposes as an employee, you were able to deduct the cost as long as you met certain requirements such as your computer must be used for convenience and as a condition of your employment, for instance, or if you telecommute two days a week and work in the office the other three days.

If you are self-employed, you can take advantage of Section 179 expensing even if you don’t claim the home office deduction. Section 179 allows you to write off new equipment (including computers) in the year it was purchased as long as it is used for business more than 50 percent of the time (subject to certain rules).

7. Have Your Company Buy You Dinner

Prior to tax reform, i.e., for tax years before 2018, this expense was 100 percent deductible. Furthermore, per tax reform legislation, this expense is nondeductible after 2025. However, for tax years prior to 2018 the following was allowed:

If you are in a partnership or a shareholder-employee in a regular C or S corporation, and you have to work overtime, your company can, on occasion, provide you with meal money for dinner. The cost of this “fringe benefit” is 50 percent deductible for your company under Section 132 of the Internal Revenue Code and you don’t have to pay personal income tax on the value of the meal.

Your company can pay directly for the meal or can instead, provide you with dinner money. But, in order for this to work, the amount of money you receive for your meal must be reasonable. If the IRS decides that the amount of money you received from your employer was unreasonable, the entire amount will be considered taxable personal income and will not be deductible.

by Donald Hayden

02 Aug 2024

One of the biggest hurdles you’ll face in running your own business is staying on top of your numerous obligations to federal, state, and local tax agencies. Tax codes seem to be in a constant state of flux, making the Internal Revenue Code barely understandable to most people.

The old legal saying that “ignorance of the law is no excuse” is perhaps most often applied in tax settings. It is safe to assume that a tax auditor presenting an assessment of additional taxes, penalties, and interest will not look kindly on an “I didn’t know I was required to do that” claim. On the flip side, it is surprising how many small businesses overpay their taxes, neglecting to take deductions they’re legally entitled to that can help them lower their tax bill.

Preparing your taxes and strategizing as to how to keep more of your hard-earned dollars in your pocket becomes increasingly difficult with each passing year. Your best course of action to save time, frustration, money, and an auditor knocking on your door, is to have a professional accountant handle your taxes.

Tax professionals have years of experience with tax preparation, religiously attend tax seminars, read scores of journals, magazines, and monthly tax tips, among other things, to correctly interpret the changing tax code.

When it comes to tax planning for small businesses, the complexity of tax law generates a lot of folklore and misinformation that also leads to costly mistakes. With that in mind, here is a look at some of the more common small business tax misperceptions.

1. All Start-up Costs Are Immediately Deductible

Business start-up costs refer to expenses incurred before you begin operating your business. Business start-up costs include both start-up and organizational costs and vary depending on the type of business. Examples of these types of costs include advertising, travel, surveys, and training. These start-up and organizational costs are generally called capital expenditures.

Costs for a particular asset (such as machinery or office equipment) are recovered through depreciation or Section 179 expensing. When you start a business, you can elect to deduct or amortize certain business start-up costs.

You can elect to deduct up to $5,000 of business start-up and $5,000 of organizational costs paid or incurred; however, the $5,000 deduction is reduced by the amount your total start-up or organizational costs exceed $50,000, and any remaining costs must be amortized.

2. Overpaying the IRS Makes You “Audit Proof”

The IRS doesn’t care if you pay the right amount of taxes or overpay your taxes. They do care if you pay less than you owe and you can’t substantiate your deductions. Even if you overpay in one area, the IRS will still hit you with interest and penalties if you underpay in another. It is never a good idea to knowingly or unknowingly overpay the IRS. The best way to “Audit Proof” yourself is to properly document your expenses and make sure you are getting good advice from your tax accountant.

3. You Can Take More Deductions if You Are Incorporated

Self-employed individuals (sole proprietors and S Corps) qualify for many of the same deductions that incorporated businesses do, and for many small businesses, being incorporated is an unnecessary expense and burden. Start-ups can spend thousands of dollars in legal and accounting fees setting up a corporation, only to discover soon thereafter that they need to change their name or move the company in a different direction. In addition, plenty of small business owners who incorporate don’t make money for the first few years and find themselves saddled with minimum corporate tax payments and no income.

4. The Home Office Deduction Is a Red Flag for an Audit

While it used to be a red flag, this is no longer true as long as you keep excellent records that satisfy IRS requirements. Because of the proliferation of home offices, tax officials cannot possibly audit all tax returns containing the home office deduction. In other words, there is no need to fear an audit just because you take the home office deduction. A high deduction-to-income ratio, however, may raise a red flag and lead to an audit.

5. Business Expenses Are Not Deductible if You Don’t Take the Home Office Deduction

You are still eligible to take deductions for business supplies, business-related phone bills, travel expenses, printing, wages paid to employees or contract workers, depreciation of equipment used for your business, and other expenses related to running a home-based business, whether or not you take the home office deduction.

Tax reform legislation passed in 2017 repealed certain itemized deductions on Schedule A, Itemized Deductions of Form 1040 for tax years 2018 through 2025, including employee business expense deductions related to home office use.

6. Requesting an Extension on Your Taxes Is an Extension To Pay Taxes

Extensions enable you to extend your filing date only. Penalties and interest begin accruing from the date your taxes are due.

7. Part-Time Business Owners Cannot Set Up Self-Employed Pension Plans

If you start up a company while you have a salaried position complete with a 401K plan, you can still set up a SEP-IRA for your business and take the deduction.

Understanding how the tax system works is beneficial to any business owner, whether you run a small to medium-sized business or are a sole proprietor. Whether it is a missed payment or filing deadline, an improperly claimed deduction, or incomplete records, a tax headache is only one mistake away. Furthermore, even if you delegate the tax preparation to someone else, you are still liable for the accuracy of your tax returns.

by Donald Hayden

02 Aug 2024

Tax planning is the process of determining when, whether, and how to conduct business and personal transactions to defer, reduce or eliminate tax liability.

Many small business owners ignore tax planning. They don’t even think about their taxes until it’s time to meet with their accountants. But tax planning is an ongoing process, and good tax advice is a valuable commodity. It is to your benefit to review your income and expenses monthly and meet with your CPA or tax advisor quarterly to analyze how you can take full advantage of the tax credits, deductions and other breaks that are legally available to you.

Tax Avoidance vs. Tax Evasion

Although tax avoidance planning is legal, tax evasion – reducing the amount of tax owed through deceit, fraud, or concealment – is not. Frequently what sets tax evasion apart from tax avoidance is the IRS’s finding that there was fraudulent intent on the part of the business owner. The following are four of the areas the IRS examiners commonly focus on as pointing to possible fraud:

Failure to report substantial amounts of income such as a shareholder’s failure to report dividends or a store owner’s failure to report a portion of the daily business receipts.
Claims for fictitious or improper deductions on a return, such as a sales representative’s substantial overstatement of travel expenses or a taxpayer’s claim of a large deduction for charitable contributions when no verification exists.
Accounting irregularities such as a business’s failure to keep adequate records or a discrepancy between amounts reported on a corporation’s return and amounts reported on its financial statements.
Improper allocation of income to a related taxpayer in a lower tax bracket, such as where a corporation makes distributions to the controlling shareholder’s children.

Tax Planning Strategies

Countless tax planning strategies are available to small business owners. Some tax strategies target the owner’s individual tax situation, and others target the business itself. Regardless of how simple or how complex a tax strategy is, its intention will be to accomplish one or more of these often-overlapping goals:

Reducing the amount of taxable income
Lowering your tax rate
Controlling the time when the tax must be paid
Claiming any available tax credits and deductions
Controlling the effects of the Alternative Minimum Tax
Avoiding the most common tax planning mistakes

To plan effectively, you’ll need to estimate your personal and business income for the next few years. Many tax planning strategies will save tax dollars at one income level but create a larger tax bill at other income levels. You will want to avoid having the “right” tax plan made “wrong” by erroneous income projections. Once you know your approximate income, you can take the next step: estimating your tax bracket.

You should already be projecting your sales revenues, income, and cash flow for general business planning purposes. The better your estimates are, the better the odds that your tax planning efforts will succeed.

Business Meal and Entertainment Expenses

Business meal expenses are legitimate deductions that can lower your tax bill and save you money, provided you follow certain guidelines. Business must be discussed before, during, or after the meal to qualify as a deduction. Furthermore, the surroundings must be conducive to a business discussion. For instance, a small, quiet restaurant would be an ideal location for a business dinner. A nightclub would not.

Under the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017, the deduction remains at 50 percent for taxpayers who incur food and beverage expenses associated with operating a trade or business. Employee meals while on business travel also remain deductible at 50 percent. For tax years 2018 through 2025, the 50 percent deduction expands to include expenses incurred for meals furnished to employees for the employer’s convenience. Amounts after 2025 are not deductible, however.

Under the TCJA, the deduction for business entertainment expenses was eliminated.

Important Business Automobile Deductions

If you use your car for business, such as visiting clients or going to business meetings away from your regular workplace, you may be able to take certain deductions for the cost of operating and maintaining your vehicle. You can deduct car expenses by taking either the standard mileage rate or using actual expenses. The mileage reimbursement rate for 2024 is 67 cents per business mile.

If you own two cars, another way to increase deductions is to include both cars in your deductions. This deduction works because business miles driven is determined by business use. To figure business use, divide the business miles driven by the total miles driven. This strategy can result in significant deductions. Whichever method you decide to use to take the deduction, always keep accurate records such as a mileage log and receipts.

Depreciation-Related Deductions

Section 179 expensing for tax year 2024 allows you to immediately deduct, rather than depreciate over time, $1,220,000 of the first $3,050,000 of qualifying equipment placed in service during the current tax year. Equipment can be new or used and includes certain software. All depreciable equipment in a home office meets the qualification. Indexed to inflation for tax years after 2018, the deduction was enhanced under the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 to include improvements to nonresidential qualified real property such as roofs, fire protection, alarm systems, security systems, and heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning systems.

Businesses with eligible property placed in service after September 27, 2017, and before January 1, 2023, were allowed to deduct 100 percent of the cost immediately. This first-year bonus depreciation is being phased downward over four years: 80 percent in 2023, 60 percent in 2024, 40 percent in 2025, and 20 percent in 2026.

These are just a few of the tax breaks that may be available to you as a business owner. Consider meeting with a tax professional to learn about more tax-savings strategies for small businesses.

by Donald Hayden

02 Aug 2024

Information is the investor’s best tool when it comes to investing wisely. But accurate information about “microcap stocks” — low-priced stocks issued by the smallest of companies, often called “penny stocks” — may be difficult to find. Many microcap companies do not file financial reports with the SEC, so it’s hard for investors to get the facts about the company’s management, products, services, and finances. When reliable information is scarce, wrongdoers can easily spread false information about microcap companies, making profits while creating losses for unsuspecting investors.

This Financial Guide gives you the basics about microcap or “penny” stocks, discusses how to find information on them, and points out what “red flags” to watch out for.

What is a Microcap Stock?
Where do Microcap Stocks Trade?
How Are Microcap Stocks Different From Other Stocks?
Which Companies File Reports With the SEC?
Which Companies Don’t Have to File Reports With the SEC?
Offering Requirements and Exemptions
Why Public Information Is So Important?
Some Common Penny Stock Fraud Schemes
How Do I Get Information About Microcap Companies?
Steps You Should Take Before Investing

What is a Microcap Stock?

The term “microcap stock” applies to companies with low or “micro” capitalizations — meaning the total value of the company’s stock. Microcap companies typically have limited assets. For example, in recent cases where the SEC suspended trading in microcap stocks, the average company had only $6 million in net tangible assets – and nearly half had less than $1.25 million. Microcap stocks tend to be low priced and trade in low volumes.

Where do Microcap Stocks Trade?

Many microcap stocks trade in the “over-the-counter” (OTC) market and are quoted on OTC systems, such as the OTC Bulletin Board (OTCBB) or the “Pink Sheets.”

OTC Bulletin Board. The OTCBB is an electronic quotation system that displays real-time quotes, last-sale prices, and volume information for many OTC securities not listed on the NASDAQ or a national securities exchange. Brokers who subscribe to the system can use the OTCBB to look up prices or enter quotes for OTC securities.

Although the FINRA oversees the OTCBB, the OTCBB is not part of the NASDAQ. Wrongdoers often claim that an OTCBB company is a NASDAQ company to mislead investors.

The “Pink Sheets.” The Pink Sheets – named for the color of paper they’ve historically been printed on – are a weekly publication of a company called the National Quotation Bureau. They are updated daily electronically. Brokers who subscribe to the Pink Sheets can find out the names and telephone numbers of the “market makers” in various OTC stocks – meaning the brokers who commit to buying and selling those OTC securities. Unless your broker has the Pink Sheets or you contact the market makers directly, you’ll have a difficult time finding price information for most stocks quoted in the Pink Sheets.

How Are Microcap Stocks Different From Other Stocks?

Microcap stocks differ from other stocks in a number of ways:

Lack of Public Information. The biggest difference between a microcap stock and other stocks is the amount of reliable, publicly available information about the company. Larger public companies file reports with the SEC that any investor can get for free from the SEC’s website. Professional stock analysts regularly research and write about larger public companies, and it’s easy to find larger companies’ stock prices. In contrast, information about microcap companies can be extremely difficult to find, making them more vulnerable to investment fraud schemes.

The SEC has proposed new rules that will increase the amount of information brokers must gather about microcap companies before quoting prices for their stocks in the OTC market.

No Minimum Listing Standards. Companies that trade their stocks on major exchanges and in the NASDAQ must meet minimum listing standards. For example, they must have certain minimums when it comes to net assets, and minimum numbers of shareholders. In contrast, companies on the OTCBB or the Pink Sheets do not have to meet any minimum standards.

Risk. While all investments involve risk, microcap stocks are among the most risky. Many microcap companies are new, with no track record. Some of these companies have no assets or operations. Others have products and services that are still in development or have yet to be tested in the market.

Which Companies File Reports With the SEC?

In general, the federal securities laws require all but the smallest of public companies to file reports with the SEC. A company can become “public” in one of two ways – by issuing securities in an offering or transaction that’s registered with the SEC or by registering the company and its outstanding securities with the SEC. Both types of registration trigger ongoing reporting obligations, meaning the company must file periodic reports that disclose important information to investors about its business, financial condition, and management.

This information is a treasure trove for investors: it tells you whether a company is making money or losing money and why.

You’ll find this information in the company’s quarterly reports on Form 10-Q, annual reports (with audited financial statements) on Form 10-K, and periodic reports of significant events on Form 8-K.

A company must file reports with the SEC if:

It has 500 or more investors and $10 million or more in assets; or
It lists its securities on the following stock markets:
American Stock Exchange
Boston Stock Exchange
Cincinnati Stock Exchange
Chicago Stock Exchange
NASDAQ
New York Stock Exchange
Pacific Exchange
Philadelphia Stock Exchange

Currently, only about half of the 6,500 companies whose securities are quoted on the OTCBB file reports with the SEC.

In January 1999, the SEC approved a new FINRA rule allowing the FINRA to require that all OTCBB companies file updated financial reports with the SEC or with their banking or insurance regulators. The new rule now applies to all companies on the OTCBB. Companies refusing to file with the SEC or their banking or insurance regulators cannot remain on the OTCBB.

With few exceptions, companies that file reports with the SEC must do so electronically using the SEC’s EDGAR system. EDGAR stands for electronic data gathering and retrieval. The EDGAR database is available on the SEC’s Web site at www.sec.gov. You’ll find many corporate filings in the EDGAR database, including annual and quarterly reports and registration statements. Any investor can access and download this information for free from the SEC’s Web site.

As with any information, SEC filings should be read with a questioning and critical mind.

Which Companies Don’t Have to File Reports With the SEC?

Smaller companies – those with less than $10 million in assets – generally do not have to file reports with the SEC. But some smaller companies, including microcap companies, may choose voluntarily to register their securities with the SEC. As described above, companies that register with the SEC must also file quarterly, annual, and other reports.

Offering Requirements and Exemptions

Any company that wants to offer or sell securities to the public must either register with the SEC or meet an exemption. Here are two of the most common exemptions that many microcap companies use:

“Reg. A” Offerings. Companies raising less than $5 million in a 12-month period may be exempt from registering their securities under a rule known as Regulation A. Instead of filing a registration statement through EDGAR, these companies need only file a printed copy of an “offering circular” with the SEC containing financial statements and other information.
“Reg. D” Offerings. Some smaller companies offer and sell securities without registering the transaction under an exemption known as Regulation D. Regulation D exempts from registration companies that seek to raise less than $1 million dollars in a twelve-month period. It also exempts companies seeking to raise up to $5 million, as long as the companies sell to 35 or fewer individuals or any number of “accredited investors” who must meet high net worth or income standards. In addition, Regulation D exempts some larger private offerings of securities. While companies claiming an exemption under Reg. D don’t have to register or file reports with the SEC, they must still file what’s known as a “Form D” within a few days after they first sell their securities. Form D is a brief notice that includes the names and addresses of owners and stock promoters, but little other information about the company.

You may be able to find out more about Reg. D companies by contacting your state securities regulator.

Unless they otherwise file reports with the SEC, companies that are exempt from registration under Reg. A, Reg. D, or another offering exemption, do not have to file reports with the SEC.

Why Public Information Is So Important?

Many of the microcap companies that don’t file reports with the SEC are legitimate businesses with real products or services. But the lack of reliable, readily available information about some microcap companies can open the door to fraud. It’s easier to manipulate a stock when there’s little or no information available about the company.

Microcap fraud depends on spreading false information. Here’s how some perpetrators carry out their scams:

Questionable Press Releases. Con artists often issue press releases that contain exaggerations or lies about the microcap company’s sales, acquisitions, revenue projections, or new products or services.
Paid Promoters. Some microcap companies pay stock promoters to recommend or “tout” the microcap stock in supposedly independent and unbiased investment newsletters, research reports, or radio and television shows. The federal securities laws require the newsletters to disclose who paid them, the amount, and the type of payment. But many con artists fail to do so and mislead investors into believing they are receiving independent advice.
Internet Fraud. Con artists often distribute junk e-mail or “spam” over the Internet to spread false information quickly and cheaply about a microcap company to thousands of potential investors. They also use aliases on Internet bulletin boards and chat rooms to hide their identities and post messages urging investors to buy stock in microcap companies based on supposedly “inside” information about impending developments at the companies.
“Boiler Rooms” and Cold Calling. Dishonest brokers set up “boiler rooms” where a small army of high-pressure salespeople use banks of telephones to make cold calls to as many potential investors as possible. These strangers hound investors to buy “house stocks” – stocks that the firm buys or sells as a market maker or has in its inventory.

Never buy stock in response to a cold call.

Some Common Penny Stock Fraud Schemes

Microcap fraud schemes can take a variety of forms. Here’s a description of the two most common:

The Classic “Pump and Dump” Scheme. It’s common to see messages posted on the Internet that urge readers to buy a stock quickly or to sell before the price goes down, or a telemarketer will call using the same sort of pitch. Often the promoters will claim to have “inside” information about an impending development or to use an “infallible” combination of economic and stock market data to pick stocks. In reality, they may be company insiders or paid promoters who stand to gain by selling their shares after the stock price is pumped up by the buying frenzy they create. Once these con artists sell their shares and stop hyping the stock, the price typically falls, and investors lose their money.

The Off-Shore Scam. Under a rule known as “Regulation S,” companies do not have to register stock they sell outside the United States to foreign or “off-shore” investors. In the typical off-shore scam, an unscrupulous microcap company sells unregistered Reg. S stock at a deep discount to con artists posing as foreign investors. These con artists then sell the stock to U.S. investors at inflated prices, pocketing huge profits, which they share with the microcap company insiders. The flood of unregistered stock into the U.S. eventually causes the price to plummet, leaving unsuspecting U.S. investors with enormous losses.

The SEC recently strengthened Reg. S to make this type of fraud harder to conduct.

How Do I Get Information About Microcap Companies?

If you’re working with a broker or an investment adviser, you can ask your investment professional if the company files reports with the SEC and to get you written information about the company and its business, finances, and management. Be sure to carefully read the prospectus and the company’s latest financial reports.

You can also get information on your own from these sources:

From the company. Ask the company if it is registered with the SEC and files reports with us. If the company is small and unknown to most people, you should also call your state securities regulator to get information about the company, its management, and the brokers or promoters who’ve encouraged you to invest in the company.
From the SEC. A great many companies must file their reports with the SEC. Using the EDGAR database, you can find out whether a company files with the SEC, and get any reports you’re interested in. For companies that do not file on EDGAR, check with the SEC’s Public Reference Room to see whether the company has filed an offering circular under Reg. A.
From your state securities regulator. We strongly urge you to contact your state securities regulator to find out whether they have information about a company and the people behind it. Look in the government section of your phone book or visit the website of the North American Securities Administrators Association to get the relevant name and phone number. Even though the company does not have to register its securities with the SEC, it may have to register them with your state. Your regulator will tell you whether the company has been legally cleared to sell securities in your state.
From other government regulators. Many companies, such as banks, do not have to file reports with the SEC. But banks must file updated financial information with their banking regulators.

From reference books and commercial databases. Visit your local public library or the nearest law or business school library. You’ll find many reference materials containing information about companies. You can also access commercial databases for more information about the company’s history, management, products or services, revenues, and credit ratings. But there are a number of commercial resources you may consult, including: Bloomberg, Dun & Bradstreet, Hoover’s Profiles, Lexis-Nexis, and Standard & Poor’s Corporate Profiles.
The Secretary of State Where the Company Is Incorporated. Contact the secretary of state where the company is incorporated to find out whether the company is a corporation in good standing. You may also be able to obtain copies of the company’s incorporation papers and any annual reports it files with the state.

If you’ve been asked to invest in a company but you can’t find any record that the company has registered its securities with the SEC or your state, or that it’s exempt from registration, call or write your state’s securities regulator or the SEC immediately with all the details. You may have come face to face with a scam.

Steps You Should Take Before Investing

To invest wisely and avoid investment scams, research each investment opportunity thoroughly and ask questions. These simple steps can make the difference between profits and losses:

Find out whether the company has registered its securities with the SEC or your state’s securities regulators.
Make sure you understand the company’s business and its products or services.
Read the most recent reports the company has filed with its regulators and pay attention to the company’s financial statements, particularly if they are not audited or not certified by an accountant. If the company does not file reports with the SEC, be sure to ask your broker for what’s called the “Rule 15c2-11 file” on the company. That file will contain important information about the company.
Check out the people running the company with your state securities regulator, and find out if they’ve ever made money for investors before. Also ask whether the people running the company have had run-ins with the regulators or other investors.
Make sure the broker and his or her firm are registered with the SEC and licensed to do business in your state. And ask your state securities regulator whether the broker and the firm have ever been disciplined or have complaints against them.

Also, watch out for these “red flags”:

SEC Trading Suspensions. The SEC has the power to suspend trading in any stock for up to 10 days when it believes that information about the company is inaccurate or unreliable. Think twice before investing in a company that’s been the subject of an SEC trading suspension.

High Pressure Sales Tactics. Beware of brokers who pressure you to buy before you have a chance to think about and investigate the “opportunity.” Dishonest brokers may try to tell you about a “once-in-a-lifetime” opportunity or one that’s based on “inside” or “confidential” information. Don’t fall for brokers who promise spectacular profits or “guaranteed” returns. These are the hallmarks of fraud. If the deal sounds too good to be true, then it probably is.
Assets Are Large But Revenues Are Small. Microcap companies sometimes assign high values on their financial statements to assets that have nothing to do with their business. Find out whether there’s a valid explanation for low revenues, especially when the company claims to have large assets.
Odd Items in the Footnotes to the Financial Statements. Many microcap fraud schemes involve unusual transactions among individuals connected to the company. These can be unusual loans or the exchange of questionable assets for company stock, which may be discussed in the footnotes.
Unusual Auditing Issues. Be wary when a company’s auditors have refused to certify the company’s financial statements or if they’ve stated that the company may not have enough money to continue operating. Also question any change of accountants.
Insiders Own Large Amounts of the Stock. In many microcap fraud cases – especially “pump and dump” schemes – the company’s officers and promoters own significant amounts of the stock. When one person or group controls most of the stock, they can more easily manipulate the stock’s price at your expense. You can ask your broker or the company whether one person or group controls most of the company’s stock, but if the company is the subject of a scam, you may not get an honest answer.

Don’t deal with brokers who refuse to provide you with written information about the investments they’re promoting.

Never tell a cold caller your social security number or numbers for your banking and securities accounts.

Be extra wary if someone you don’t know and trust recommends foreign investments.

by Donald Hayden

02 Aug 2024

How are distributions from mutual funds taxed? What happens when they are reinvested? How are capital gains on sales of mutual funds determined? This Financial Guide provides you with tips on reducing the tax on mutual fund activities.

A basic knowledge of mutual fund taxation and careful record-keeping can help you cut the tax bite on your mutual fund investments.

You must generally report as income any mutual fund distributions, whether or not they are reinvested. The tax law generally treats mutual fund shareholders as if they directly owned a proportionate share of the fund’s portfolio of securities. Thus, all dividends and interest from securities in the portfolio, as well as any capital gains from the sales of securities, are taxed to the shareholders.

The fund itself is not taxed on its income if certain tests are met and substantially all of its income is distributed to its shareholders.

Taxable Distributions

There are two types of taxable distributions: (1) ordinary dividends and (2) capital gain distributions:

Ordinary Dividends. Distributions of ordinary dividends, which come from the interest and dividends earned by securities in the fund’s portfolio, represent the net earnings of the fund. They are paid out periodically to shareholders. Like the return on any other investment, mutual fund dividend payments decline or rise from year to year, depending on the income earned by the fund in accordance with its investment policy. These dividend payments are considered ordinary income and must be reported on your tax return.Qualified dividends. Qualified dividends are ordinary dividends that are subject to the same tax rates that apply to net long-term capital gains. Dividends from mutual funds qualify where a mutual fund is receiving qualified dividends and distributing the required proportions thereof. Dividends from foreign corporations are qualified where their stock or ADRs are traded on U.S. exchanges or with IRS approval where the dividends are covered by U.S. tax treaties.
Capital gain distributions. When gains from the fund’s sales of securities exceed losses, they are distributed to shareholders. As with ordinary dividends, these capital gain distributions vary in amount from year to year. They are treated as long-term capital gain, regardless of how long you have owned your fund shares. A mutual fund owner may also have capital gains from selling mutual fund shares.

Capital gains rates

The beneficial long-term capital gains rates on sales of mutual fund shares apply only to profits on shares held more than a year before sale. Profit on shares held a year or less before the sale is ordinary income, but capital gain distributions are long-term regardless of the length of time held before the distribution.

In 2023, tax rates on capital gains and dividends remain the same as 2022 rates (0%, 15%, and a top rate of 20%); however, threshold amounts are different in that they don’t correspond to new tax bracket structure as they did in the past. The maximum zero percent rate amounts are $44,625 for individuals and $89,250 for married filing jointly. For an individual taxpayer whose income is at or above $492,300 ($553,850 married filing jointly), the rate for both capital gains and dividends is capped at 20 percent. All other taxpayers fall into the 15 percent rate amount (i.e., above $44,625 and below $492,300 for single filers).

In 2023, say your taxable income, apart from long-term capital gains and qualified dividends, is $87,000. Even though you’re in a middle-income tax bracket (22 percent on a joint return in 2023) you’ll get the benefit of a lower capital gains tax rate, in this case, 15 percent for long-term gains and qualified dividends.

For tax years 2013-2017 dividend income that fell in the highest tax bracket (39.6%) was taxed at 20 percent. For the middle tax brackets (25-35%) the dividend tax rate was 15 percent, and for the two lower ordinary income tax brackets of 10% and 15%, the dividend tax rate was zero.

At tax time, your mutual fund will send you a Form 1099-DIV, which tells you what earnings to report on your income tax return, and how much of it is qualified dividends. Because tax rates on qualified dividends are the same as for capital gains distributions and long-term gains on sales, Congress wants these items combined in your tax reporting, that is, qualified dividends added to long-term capital gains. Also, capital losses are netted against capital gains before applying favorable capital gains rates. Losses will not be netted against dividends.

Undistributed capital gains. Mutual funds sometimes retain a part of their capital gain and pay tax on them. You must report your share of such gains and can claim a credit for the tax paid. The mutual fund will report these amounts to you on Form 2439. You increase your shares’ “cost basis” (more about this in Tip No. 5, below) by 65 percent of the gain, representing the gain reduced by the credit.

Medicare Tax

Starting with tax year 2013, an additional Medicare tax of 3.8 percent is applied to net investment income for individuals with modified adjusted gross income above $200,000 (single filers) and $250,000 (joint filers). These amounts are not indexed for inflation.

Now that you have a better understanding of how mutual funds are taxed, here are 13 tips for minimizing the tax on your mutual fund activities:

Tip #1: Keep Track of Reinvested Dividends
Tip #2: Be Aware That Exchanges of Shares Are Taxable Events
Tip #3: Be Wary of Buying Shares Just Before Ex-Dividend Date
Tip #4: Do Not Overlook the Advantages of Tax-Exempt Funds
Tip #5: Keep Records of Your Mutual Fund Transactions
Tip #6: Reinvesting Dividends & Capital Gain Distributions when Calculating
Tip #7: Adjust Cost Basis for Non-Taxable Distributions
Tip #8: Use the Best Method of Identifying Sold Shares
Tip #9: Avoid Backup Withholding
Tip #10 Don’t Forget State Taxation
Tip #11: Don’t Overlook Possible Tax Credits For Foreign Income
Tip #12: Be Careful About Trying the “Wash Sale“ Rule
Tip #13: Choose Tax-Efficient Funds
How The Various Identification Methods Compare
Government and Non-Profit Agencies

Tip #1: Keep Track of Reinvested Dividends

Most funds offer you the option of having dividend and capital gain distributions automatically reinvested in the fund – a good way to buy new shares and expand your holdings. While most shareholders take advantage of this service, it is not a way to avoid being taxed. Reinvested ordinary dividends are still taxed (at long-term capital gains rates if qualified), just as if you had received them in cash. Similarly, reinvested capital gain distributions are taxed as long-term capital gain.

If you reinvest, add the amount reinvested to the “cost basis” of your account, i.e., the amount you paid for your shares. The cost basis of your new shares purchased through automatic reinvesting is easily seen from your fund account statements. This information is important later on when you sell shares (more about that in Tip No. 5).

Tip #2: Be Aware That Exchanges of Shares Are Taxable Events

The “exchange privilege,” or the ability to exchange shares of one fund for shares of another, is a popular feature of many mutual fund “families,” i.e., fund organizations that offer a variety of funds. For tax purposes, exchanges are treated as if you had sold your shares in one fund and used the cash to purchase shares in another fund. In other words, you must report any capital gain from the exchange on your return. The same tax rules used for calculating gains and losses when you redeem shares apply when you exchange them.

Gains on these redemptions and exchanges are taxable whether the fund invests in taxable or tax-exempt securities.

Tip #3: Be Wary of Buying Shares Just Before Ex-Dividend Date

Tax law requires that mutual funds distribute at least 98 percent of their ordinary and capital gain income annually. Thus, many funds make disproportionately large distributions in December. The date on which a fund’s shareholders become entitled to future payment of a distribution is referred to as the ex-dividend date. On that date, the fund’s net asset value (NAV) is reduced on a per-share basis by the exact amount of the distribution. Buying mutual fund shares just before this date can trigger an unexpected tax.

You buy 1,000 shares of Fund XYZ at $10 a share. A few days later, the fund goes ex-dividend, entitling you to a $1 per share distribution. Because $1 of your $10 NAV is being distributed to you, the value of your 1,000 shares is reduced to $9,000. As with any fund distribution, you may receive the $1,000 in cash or reinvest it and receive additional shares. In either case, you must pay tax on the distribution.

If you reinvest the $1,000, the distribution has the appearance of a wash in your account since the value of your fund investment remains $10,000. The $1,000 reinvestment results in the acquisition of 111.1 new shares with a $9 NAV and increases the cost basis of your total investment to $11,000. If you were to redeem your shares for $10,000 (their current value), you would realize a $1,000 capital loss.

In spite of these tax consequences, in some instances it may be a good idea to buy shares right before the fund goes ex-dividend. For instance, the distribution could be relatively small, with only minor tax consequences. Or the market could be moving up, with share prices expected to be higher after the ex-dividend date.

To find out a fund’s ex-dividend date call the fund directly.

If you regularly check the mutual fund quotes in your daily newspaper and notice a decline in NAV from the previous day, the explanation may be that the fund has just gone ex-dividend. Newspapers generally use a footnote to indicate when a fund goes ex-dividend.

Tip #4: Do Not Overlook the Advantages of Tax-Exempt Funds

If you are in the higher tax brackets and are seeing your investment profits taxed away, then there is a good alternative to consider: tax-exempt mutual funds. Distributions from such funds that are attributable to interest from state and municipal bonds are exempt from federal income tax (although they may be subject to state tax).

The same is true of distributions from tax-exempt money market funds. These funds also invest in municipal bonds, but only in those that are short-term or close to maturity, the aim being to reduce the fluctuation in NAV that occurs in long-term funds.

Many taxpayers can ease their tax bite by investing in municipal bond funds. The catch with municipal bond funds is that they offer lower yields than comparable taxable bonds. For example, if a U.S. Treasury bond yields 2.8 percent, then a quality municipal bond of the same maturity might yield 2.45 percent. If an investor is in a higher tax bracket, the tax advantage makes it worthwhile to invest in the lower-yielding tax-exempt fund. Whether the tax advantage actually benefits a particular investor depends on that investor’s tax bracket.

To figure out how much you would have to earn on a taxable investment to equal the yield on a tax-exempt investment, use this formula: Tax-exempt yield divided by (1 minus your tax bracket) = equivalent yield of a taxable investment.

You are planning for the 32% bracket. The yield of a tax-exempt investment is 2.8 percent. Applying the formula, we get .028 divided by .68 (1 minus .32) = .041. Therefore, 4.1 percent is the yield you would need from a taxable investment to match the tax-exempt yield of 2.8 percent.

In limited cases based on the types of bonds involved, part of the income earned by tax-exempt funds may be subject to the federal alternative minimum tax.

Although income from tax-exempt funds is federally tax-exempt, you must still report on your tax return the amount of tax-exempt income you received during the year. This is an information-reporting requirement only and does not convert tax-exempt earnings into taxable income.

Your tax-exempt mutual fund will send you a statement summarizing its distributions for the past year and explaining how to handle tax-exempt dividends on a state-by-state basis.

Capital gain distributions paid by municipal bond funds (unlike distributions of interest) are not free from federal tax. Most states also tax these capital gain distributions.

Tip #5: Keep Records of Your Mutual Fund Transactions

It is very important to keep the statements from each mutual fund you own, especially the year-end statement.

By law, mutual funds must send you a record of every transaction in your account, including reinvestments and exchanges of shares. The statement shows the date, amount, and number of full and fractional shares bought or sold. These transactions are also contained in the year-end statement.

In addition, you will receive a year-end Form 1099-B, which reports the sale of fund shares, for any non-IRA mutual fund account in which you sold shares during the year.

Why is record keeping so important? When you sell mutual fund shares, you will realize a capital gain or loss in the year the shares are sold. You must pay tax on any capital gain arising from the sale, just as you would from the sale of individual securities. (Losses may be used to offset other gains in the current year and deducted up to an additional $3,000 of ordinary income. Remaining loss may be carried for comparable treatment in later years.)

The amount of the gain or loss is determined by the difference between the cost basis of the shares (generally the original purchase price) and the sale price. Thus, in order to figure the gain or loss on a sale of shares, it is essential to know the cost basis. If you have kept your statements, you will be able to figure this out.

In 2012, you purchased 100 shares of Fund JKL at $10 a share for a total purchase price of $1,000. Your cost basis for each share is $10 (what you paid for the shares). Any fees or commissions paid at the time of purchase are included in the basis, so since you paid an up-front commission of two percent, or $20, on the purchase, your cost basis for each share is $10.20 ($1,020 divided by 100). Let’s say you sell your Fund JKL shares this year for $1,500. Assume there are no adjustments to your $ 1,020 basis, such as basis attributable to shares purchased through reinvestment (for an example of the effect of reinvestment on the cost basis, see Tip #6.). On this year’s income tax return, you report a capital gain of $480 ($1,500 minus $1,020).

Since they are taken into account in your cost basis, commissions or brokerage fees are not deductible separately as investment expenses on your tax return.

One of the advantages of mutual fund investing is that the fund provides you with all of the records that you need to compute gains and losses–a real plus at tax time. Some funds even provide cost basis information or compute gains and losses for shares sold. That is why it is important to save the statements. However, you are not required to use the fund’s gain or loss computations in your tax reporting.

Tip #6: Reinvesting Dividends & Capital Gain Distributions when Calculating

Make sure that you do not pay any unnecessary capital gain taxes on the sale of mutual fund shares because you forgot about reinvested amounts. When you reinvest dividends and capital gain distributions to buy more shares, you should add the cost of those shares (that is, the amount invested) to the cost basis of the shares in that account because you have already paid tax on those shares. Failure to include reinvested dividends and capital gain distributions in your cost basis is a costly mistake.

You bought 500 shares in Fund PQR 15 years ago for $10,000. Over the years, you reinvested dividends and capital gain distributions in the amount of $8,000, for which you received 100 additional shares. This year, you sell all 600 of those shares for $40,000. If you forget to include the price paid for the 100 shares purchased through reinvestment (even though the fund sent you a statement recording the shares you received in each transaction), you will unwittingly report on your tax return a capital gain of $30,000 ($40,000 – $ 10,000) on your redemption of 600 shares, rather than the correct capital gain of 22,000 ($40,000 – [$10,000 + $8,000]).

Tip #7: Adjust Cost Basis for Non-Taxable Distributions

Sometimes mutual funds make distributions to shareholders that are not attributable to the fund’s earnings. These are nontaxable distributions, also known as returns of capital. Because a return of capital is a return of part of your investment, it is not taxable. Your mutual fund will show any return of capital on Form 1099-DIV in the box for nontaxable distributions.

Nontaxable distributions are not the same as the tax-exempt dividends described in Tip No. 4.

If you receive a return-of-capital distribution, your basis in the shares is reduced by the amount of the return.

Fifteen years ago, you purchased 1,000 shares of Fund ABC at $10 a share. The following year you received a $1-per-share return-of-capital distribution, which reduced your basis in those shares by $1, to give you an adjusted basis of $9 per share. This year you sell your 1,000 shares for $15 a share. Assuming no other transactions during this period, you would have a capital gain this year of $6 a share ($15 – $9) for a total reported capital gain of $6,000.

Nontaxable distributions cannot reduce your basis below zero. If you receive returns of capital that, taken together, exceed your original basis, you must report the excess as a long-term capital gain.

Your overall basis will not change if non-taxable distributions are reinvested. However, your per-share basis will be reduced.

Tip #8: Use the Best Method of Identifying Sold Shares

Calculating the capital gain or loss on shares you sell is somewhat more complicated if, as is usually the case, you are selling only some of your shares. You then must use some accounting method to identify which shares were sold to determine your capital gain or loss. The IRS recognizes several methods of identifying the shares sold:

First-in, first-out (FIFO),
Average cost (single category and double category), and
Specific identification.

Reports from your funds may include a computation of gain or loss on your sale of mutual fund shares. Typically, these will use the average cost method, single category rule. This is done as a convenience. You are allowed to adopt one of the other methods.

First-In, First-Out (FIFO)

Under this method, the first shares bought are considered the first shares sold. Unless you specify that you are using one of the other methods, the IRS will assume you are using FIFO.

Average Cost

This approach allows you to calculate an average cost for each share by adding up the total cost of all the shares you own in a particular mutual fund and dividing by the number of shares. If you elect to take an average cost approach, you must then choose whether to use a single-category method or a double-category method.

With the single category method, you simply group all shares together, add up the cost, and divide by the number of shares. Under this method, you are deemed to have sold first the shares you have held the longest.
The double category method enables you to separate short-term and long-term shares. Shares held for one year or less are considered short-term; shares held for more than one year are considered long-term. You average the cost of shares in each category separately. In this way, you may specify whether you are redeeming long-term or short-term shares.

Keep in mind that once you elect to use either average cost method, you must continue to use it for all transactions in that fund unless you receive IRS approval to change your method.

Specific Identification

Under this method, you specify the individual shares that are sold. If you have kept track of the purchase prices and dates of all your fund shares, including shares purchased with reinvested distributions, you will be able to identify, for example, those shares with the highest purchase prices and indicate that they are the shares you are selling. This strategy gives you the smallest capital gain and could save you a significant amount on your taxes.

To take advantage of this method, you must, at the time of the sale or exchange, indicate to your broker or to the mutual fund itself the particular shares you are selling. The IRS also insists that you receive written confirmation of your instructions.

To see the advantages and disadvantages of these methods of identifying sold shares, see How The Various Identification Methods Compare (below).

Money market funds present a very simple case when you redeem shares. Because most money market funds maintain a stable net asset value of $1 per share, you have no capital gain or loss when you sell shares. Thus, you only pay tax on any earnings distributed.

Tip #9: Avoid Backup Withholding

One way the IRS makes sure it receives taxes owed by taxpayers is through backup withholding. In the mutual fund context, this means that a mutual fund company is required to deduct and withhold a specified percentage (see below) of your dividend and redemption proceeds if one of the following situations has occurred:

You have not supplied your taxpayer identification number (Social Security number) to the fund company;
You supplied a TIN that the IRS finds to be wrong;
The IRS finds you have underreported your interest and dividend payments; or
You failed to tell the fund company you are not subject to backup withholding.

The backup withholding percentage is 24 percent for tax years 2018-2025 (28 percent in prior years).

Tip #10 Don’t Forget State Taxation

Many states treat mutual fund distributions the same way the federal government does. There are, however, some differences. For example,:

- - If your mutual fund invests in U.S. government obligations, states generally exempt from state taxation dividends attributable to federal obligation interest.
  - Most states do not tax income from their own obligations, whether held directly or through mutual funds. On the other hand, the majority of states do tax income from the obligations of other states. Thus, in most states, you will not pay state tax to the extent you receive, through the fund, income from obligations issued by your state or its municipalities.
  - Most states don’t grant reduced rates for capital gains or dividends.

Tip #11: Don’t Overlook Possible Tax Credits For Foreign Income

If your fund invests in foreign stocks or bonds, part of the income it distributes may have been subject to foreign tax withholding. If so, you may be entitled to a tax deduction or credit for your pro-rata share of taxes paid. Your fund will provide you with the necessary information.

Because a tax credit provides a dollar-for-dollar offset against your tax bill, while a deduction reduces the amount of income on which you must pay tax, it is generally advantageous to claim the foreign tax credit. If the foreign tax doesn’t exceed $300 ($600 on a joint return), then you may not need to file IRS form 1116 to claim the credit.

Tip #12: Be Careful About Trying the “Wash Sale“ Rule

If you sell fund shares at a loss (so you can take a capital loss on your return) and then repurchase shares in the same fund shortly thereafter, beware of the wash sale rule. This rule bars a loss deduction when a taxpayer buys “substantially identical” shares within 30 days before or after the date of sale.

Be sure to wait more than thirty (30) days before reinvesting.

Tip #13: Choose Tax-Efficient Funds

Many investors who hold mutual funds directly may hold others through tax-sheltered accounts such as 401(k)s, IRAs, and Keoghs. Your aggressive high-turnover funds and high-income funds should be in tax-sheltered accounts. These generate more current income and gains, currently taxable if held directly but tax-deferred in tax-sheltered accounts. Buy-to-hold funds and low activity funds such as index funds should be owned directly (as opposed to a tax-sheltered account). With relatively small currently distributable income, such investments can continue to grow with only a modest reduction for current taxes.

For some investors, the simpler approach may be to hold mutual funds personally and more highly taxed income (such as bond interest) in the tax-sheltered account.

As you can see, there are many tax pitfalls that await the unwary mutual fund investor. Professional guidance should be considered to minimize the tax impact.

How The Various Identification Methods Compare

To illustrate the advantages and disadvantages of the various methods of identifying the shares that you sell, assume that you bought 100 shares of Fund PQR in January 2005 at $20 a share, 100 shares in January 2006 at $30 a share, and 100 shares in November 2010 at $46 a share. You sell 50 shares in June of this year for $50 a share. Here are your alternative ways to determine cost basis.

1. 1. First-In, First-Out (FIFO).The FIFO method identifies the 50 shares sold as among the first 100 shares purchased. Your cost basis per share is $20. This rate gives you a capital gain of $1,500 ($2,500 – (50 x $20)).
  2. Advantages/Disadvantages. In this example, this method produces the highest amount of capital gain on which you are taxed. FIFO provides the lowest capital gain amount when the fund’s net asset value has declined, and the first shares purchased were the most expensive. It can also sometimes save tax when shares bought later weren’t held long enough to qualify for long-term capital gains treatment.
  3. Average Cost/Single Category. Average cost/single category allows you to calculate the average price paid for all shares in the fund. Here, your cost basis per share is $32 (your 300 shares cost $9,600: $9,600 divided by 300 = $32), giving you a capital gain of $900 ($2,500 – (50 x $32)).
  4. Advantages/Disadvantages.: Compared to FIFO, this method can reduce the amount of your capital gain if the fund’s net asset value has increased over time. You could generate a lower long-term capital gain by using specific identification, but average cost/single category is useful if you did not designate shares at the time of sale or you simply do not want to do the record-keeping required to use the specific identification method.
  5. Average Cost/Double Category. Under this method, you average the cost of the short-term shares (those held for one year or less) and the cost of the long-term shares (those held for more than one year) separately. Thus, in the long-term category, you have 200 shares at $5,000 for an average cost of $25 per share ($5,000 x 200), and in the short-term category, you have 100 shares at $4,600 for an average cost of $46 per share ($4,600 divided by 100). Comparing the two categories, your taxable gain using the long-term shares would be $1,250 ($2,500 – (50 x $25)), to be taxed at up to 20 percent, while your taxable gain using the short-term shares would be $200 ($2,500 – (50 x $46)), to be taxed at up to 37 percent (top rate for 2023).
  6. Advantages/Disadvantages. In this example, using the average cost of short-term shares produces a better result. However, because of the current spread between the top marginal income tax rates and the maximum rate on long-term capital gains, it could make sense in some instances to choose the long-term shares. Furthermore, as with specific identification, you must plan ahead to use this method by specifying to the broker or mutual fund company at the time of sale that you are selling short-term or long-term shares, and you must receive confirmation of your specification in writing. If you have elected to use average cost-double category but do not specify for a particular redemption whether you are redeeming short-term or long-term shares, the IRS will deem you to have redeemed the long-term shares first.
  7. Specific identification. With this method, you designate which shares you are selling. To reduce your capital gains tax bill the most, you would select the shares with the highest purchase price. In this case, you would identify the 50 shares sold as among those purchased in 1999. Your cost basis, therefore, is $46 per share, giving you a capital gain of $200 ($2,500 – (50 x $46)).
  8. Advantages/Disadvantages: This method can produce favorable results in lowering the capital gain, but IRS regulations require you to think ahead by providing instructions before the sale and then receiving confirmation of your specification in writing. The IRS will not let you designate shares after the fact.

Government and Non-Profit Agencies

US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC)

Securities and Exchange Commission

100 F Street, NE
Washington, D.C. 20549
(202) 942-8088

The SEC has public reference rooms at its headquarters in Washington, D.C., and at its Northeast and Midwest Regional offices. Copies of the text of documents filed in these reference rooms may be obtained by visiting or writing the Public Reference Room (at a standard per page reproduction rate) or through private contractors (who charge for research and/or reproduction).

Other sources of information filed with the SEC include public or law libraries, securities firms, financial service bureaus, computerized on-line services, and the companies themselves.

Most companies whose stock is traded over the counter or on a stock exchange must file “full disclosure” reports on a regular basis with the SEC. The annual report (Form 10-K) is the most comprehensive of these. It contains a narrative description and statistical information on the company’s business, operations, properties, parents, and subsidiaries; its management, including their compensation and ownership of company securities: and significant legal proceedings which involve the company. Form 10-K also contains the audited financial statements of the company (including a balance sheet, an income statement, and a statement of cash flow) and provides management’s discussion of business operations and prospects for the future.

Quarterly financial information on Form 8-K may be required as well.

Anyone may search the SEC’s Company Filings database for information regarding to including quarterly and annual reports, registration statements for IPOs and other offerings, insider trading reports, and proxy materials.

American Association of Individual Investors
(Offers an annual guide to low-load mutual funds):

625 North Michigan Avenue
Chicago, IL 60611
Tel: 312-280-0170 or 800-428-2244

Investment Company Institute
(Publishes an annual directory of mutual funds):

1401 H Street NW, Suite 1200
Washington, DC 20005
Tel: 202-326-5800

Investment Management Education Alliance
(Offers a free Portfolio tool, complete with data from Morningstar, Inc.):

2345 Grand Boulevard
Kansas City, MO 64108
Tel: 816-454-9427

by Donald Hayden

02 Aug 2024

Mutual funds are an excellent way to invest in stocks, bonds and other securities. They are a good choice of investment because:

They are managed by professional money managers, so most of the investment research is done for you (most investors don’t have the time or know-how to do all the necessary research).
You diversify your investment risk by owning shares in a mutual fund, instead of buying individual stocks or bonds directly.
Transaction costs are often lower than what you would pay if you invested in individual securities (the mutual fund buys and sells large amounts of securities at a time).

Before getting into our discussion of mutual funds, there are three important points to keep in mind:

Past performance is not a reliable indicator of future performance. Beware of dazzling performance claims. Many publications recommend mutual funds based only on past performance.
Mutual funds are not guaranteed or insured by any bank or government agency. Even if you buy through a bank and the fund carries the bank’s name, there is no guarantee. You can lose your investment.
All mutual funds have costs that lower your investment returns. Thus, even an index fund that mirrors a broad market index cannot perform as well as its mirror index, since the fund has transaction and operating costs that the index does not.

How To Choose A Mutual Fund
What About Recommendations?
Comparing Performance
Comparing Costs
Comparing Investment Philosophy
Comparing Customer Service
Risk Factors In General
Summary
Government and Non-Profit Agencies

How To Choose A Mutual Fund

Once you determine your asset allocation model, you can implement the recommended portfolio with mutual funds. You need only six to ten funds to achieve diversification and your asset allocation objectives, as opposed to having to buy many more individual securities to achieve the same results.

Caution: Keep in mind that mutual funds ALWAYS carry investment risks. Some carry more risk than others; a higher rate of return typically involves a higher risk. don’t buy a fund without knowing–and being willing to accept–the risk. The types of risks that attend a mutual fund depend on the type of fund. Risks are discussed later in the section on “Types of Mutual Funds and Their Varying Risk Factors.”

Once you identify the asset classes that will be represented in your portfolio, it’s time to select specific funds in those categories-i.e., funds that meet your investment goals. To choose wisely, it’s necessary to assess:

A fund’s risk/reward history and characteristics, which should match your own financial profile;
A fund’s philosophy and investment style, which should match your own investment goals;
A fund’s costs, including loads and ongoing expenses; and
The customer service available from the fund.

Tip: Find out whether the fund will stop offering shares to the public once its assets have grown to a certain point (sometimes the case with small-cap funds).

What About Recommendations?

Most sources of mutual fund recommendations are inadequate. They either depend solely on past performance or fail to take into account your particular needs. Newsletters and magazines, for example, often simply recommend last year’s hot fund-which, even though it may remain hot for the current year, may be totally wrong for you.

Comparing Performance

A fund’s past performance is not as important as you might think. Advertisements, rankings, and ratings tell you how well a fund has performed in the past. But studies show that the future is often different. This year’s “No. 1” fund can easily become next year’s dog.

Tip: Although past performance is not a reliable indicator of future performance, past volatility is a good indicator of future volatility.

Here are some tips for comparing fund performances:

Check the fund’s total return. You will find it in the Financial Highlights of the prospectus (near the front). Total return measures increases and decreases in the value of the investment over time, after subtracting costs. This is just one of many return measures.
Find out how the fund ranked in its investment category class. There are various rating systems available to show how a fund ranked among its peers.
See how the total return has varied over the years. The Financial Highlights in the prospectus show yearly total return for the most recent 10-year period. An impressive 10-year total return may be based on one spectacular year followed by many average years. Looking at year-to-year changes in total return is a good way to see how stable the fund’s returns have been.
Check the fund’s Sharpe ratio. The Sharpe ratio is intended to give investors an understanding of the fund’s performance relative to the risk. The Sharpe ratio is calculated by subtracting the average monthly return of the 90-day Treasury Bill-basically a risk-free return-from the average monthly return of the fund. The difference-the “excess” return- is then annualized and divided by the fund’s annual standard deviation (a common measure of volatility).

Tip: Mathematical theory aside, the important point is that the higher the Sharpe ratio, the higher the fund’s performance with less of a risk.

Comparing Costs

Costs are important because they lower your returns. A fund that has a sales load and high expenses will have to perform better than a low-cost fund, just to stay even.

Find the fee table near the front of the fund’s prospectus, where the fund’s costs are laid out. You can use the fee table to compare the costs of different funds.

The fee table breaks costs into two main categories:

Sales loads and transaction fees (paid when you buy, sell or exchange your shares) and
Ongoing expenses (paid while you remain invested in the fund).

Sales Loads

The first part of the fee table will tell you if the fund charges any sales loads. No-load funds by definition, do not charge sales loads. There are no-load funds in every major fund category. Even no-load funds have ongoing expenses, however, such as management fees.

A sales load usually pays for commissions to the brokers who sell the fund’s shares to you, as well as other marketing costs. Sales loads buy you a broker’s services and advice; they do not assure superior performance.

Front-end load: A front-end load is a sales charge you pay when you buy shares. This type of load, which by law cannot be higher than 8.5 percent of your investment-although in practice are often much less-reduces the amount of your investment in the fund.

Back-end load: A back-end load (also called a deferred load) is a sales charge you pay when you sell or exchange your shares. It usually starts out at 5 or 6 percent for the first year and gets smaller each year after that until it reaches zero say, in year six or seven year of your investment.

Example: You invest $1,000 in a mutual fund with a 6 percent back-end load that decreases to zero in the seventh year. Let’s assume that the value of your investment remains at $1,000 for seven years. If you sell your shares during the first year, you will get back only $940 (the $60 will go to pay the sales charge). If you sell your shares during the seventh year, you will get back $1,000.

Tip: Many funds allow you to exchange your shares for those of another fund managed by the same adviser. The first part of the fee table will tell you if there is any exchange fee.

Ongoing Expenses

The second part of the fee table tells you the kinds of ongoing expenses you will pay while you remain invested in the fund. It shows expenses as a percentage of the fund’s assets, generally for the most recent fiscal year. Here, the table will tell you the management fee for managing the fund’s portfolio, along with any other fees and expenses.

Caution: Check the fee table to see if any part of a fund’s fees or expenses has been waived. If so, the fees and expenses may increase suddenly when the waiver ends (the part of the prospectus after the fee table will tell you by how much).

High expenses do not assure superior performance. Higher-expense funds do not, on average, perform better than lower-expense funds. But there may be circumstances in which you decide it is appropriate to pay higher expenses. For example, you can expect to pay higher expenses for certain types of funds that require extra work by managers, such as international stock funds, which require sophisticated research.

Caution: You may also pay higher expenses for funds that provide special services, like toll-free telephone numbers, check-writing and automatic investment programs.

A difference in expenses that may look small to you can make a big difference in the value of your investment over time.

Example: You invest $1,000 in a fund, which yields an annual return of 5 percent before expenses. If the fund has expenses of 1.5 percent, after 20 years you would end up with roughly $2,012. If the fund has expenses of 0.5 percent, you would end up with more than $2,455 – a 22 percent difference. If your investment is $100,000 instead of $1,000, that means a difference of more than $44,000.

Rule 12b-1 fee: One type of ongoing fee that is taken out of fund assets has come to be known as a Rule 12b-1 fee. It most often is used to pay commissions to brokers and other salespersons, and occasionally to pay for advertising and other costs of promoting the fund to investors. It usually is between 0.25 percent and 1.00 percent of assets annually.

Funds with back-end loads usually have higher Rule 12b-1 fees. If you are considering whether to pay a front-end load or a back-end load, think about how long you plan to stay in the fund. If you plan to stay in for six years or more, a back-end load will usually cost less than a front-end load.

Caution: Yet, even if your back-end load has fallen to zero, you could pay more in Rule 12b-1 fees over time than if you paid a front-end load.

Comparing Investment Philosophy

Here are some suggestions for examining a fund’s approach to investing.

1. Determine the fund’s overall investment objectives.

Tip: Morningstar’s system of rating mutual funds includes 40 investment objectives. This extensive list can be helpful in narrowing the comparison of funds’ objectives. Morningstar’s style boxes can also be used to compare funds’ styles.

2. Determine whether the fund’s portfolio matches its stated investment objectives. The fund should fully reveal how it invests.

Tip: Morningstar’s “style boxes” are extremely useful in determining (1) whether a fund’s investment approach has a low, moderate, or high risk/return profile and (2) the types of securities invested in.

3. Determine whether the fund invests overseas.

Caution: Generally, international equities are a longer-term, higher-risk investment.

4. For an equity fund, determine the industry sectors in which it’s invested.

5. For a bond fund, determine the years to maturity of its holdings and whether it holds any tax-exempt bonds.

6. Find out how long the fund’s management has been in place and whether one particular manager has been responsible for the success of the fund.

Caution: If the manager is relatively new, this may add risk to the fund, unless the manager has had experience elsewhere.

Comparing Customer Service

You’ll want to find out what services the fund offers. Among the questions you should ask are:

How long does it take to reach a representative?
Which account options does the fund offer?
How quickly are questions about returns or investments answered?

Risk Factors In General

You take risks when you invest in any mutual fund. You may lose some or all of the money you invest (your principal) because the securities held by a fund go up and down in value. What you earn on your investment (dividends and interest) also may go up or down. The various types of risk are:

Volatility: The unpredictability of changes in stock prices.
Interest-rate risk: The fluctuation in bond prices due to interest rate changes.
Credit risk: The likelihood that payments of bond interest and principal will not be made as promised.
Inflation risk: The risk that the lowered purchasing power of the dollar will erode your return.

Each kind of mutual fund has different risks and rewards. Generally, the higher the potential return, the higher the risk of loss. The following discussion of risk for the various types of funds is intended to aid you in choosing a fund that meets your requirements as an investor.

Money Market Fund Risks

Money market funds are relatively low risk compared to other mutual funds. They are limited by law to certain high-quality, short-term investments. They try to keep their net asset value (NAV) at a stable $1.00 per share.

Caution: Contrary to popular belief, NAV may fall below $1.00 if the funds’ investments perform poorly. Although investor losses have been rare, they are possible.

Caution: Banks now sell mutual funds, some of which carry the bank’s name. But mutual funds sold by banks, including money market funds, are not bank deposits. Don’t confuse a “money market fund” with a “money market deposit account.” The names are similar, but they are completely different:

A money market fund is a type of mutual fund. It is not guaranteed, and comes with a prospectus.
A money market deposit account is a bank deposit. It is guaranteed, and comes with a “Truth in Savings” form.

Caution: Many bank funds are just “private label” funds, i.e., run by a fund family for the bank. This adds an extra layer of cost.

Bond Fund Risks

Bond funds (also called fixed-income funds) have higher risks than money market funds, but usually pay higher yields. Unlike money market funds, bond funds are not restricted to high-quality or short-term investments. Because there are many different types of bonds, bond funds can vary dramatically in their risks and rewards.

Most bond funds have credit risk, the risk that companies or other issuers whose bonds are owned by the fund may fail to pay their bond holders. Some funds have little credit risk, however, such as those that invest in insured bonds or U.S. Treasury bonds. Keep in mind that nearly all bond funds have interest rate risk, which means that the market value of their bonds will go down when interest rates go up. Because of this, you can lose money in any bond fund, including those that invest only in insured bonds or Treasury bonds. Long-term bond funds invest in bonds with longer maturities (the length of time until the final payout). The net asset values (NAVs) of long-term bond funds can go up or down more rapidly than those of shorter-term bond funds.

Tip: Morningstar’s rating system uses specific times to maturity to distinguish between long-term, short-term and medium-term bonds. This system can help you choose the bond fund that is most suitable with regard to interest-rate risk.

Stock Fund Risks

Stock funds (also called equity funds) generally involve more risk-volatility-than money market or bond funds, but they also offer the highest returns. A stock fund’s value can rise and fall quickly over the short term, but historically stocks have performed better over the long term than other types of investments.

Mutual fund rating companies use “beta” to measure risk. Beta measures a fund’s price fluctuations relative to those of the whole market-that is, its sensitivity to market movements.

Not all stock funds are the same. For example, growth funds focus on stocks that may not pay a regular dividend but have the potential for large capital gains. Others specialize in a particular industry segment such as technology stocks.

The level of volatility in a stock fund depends on the fund’s investments, e.g., small-cap growth stocks are more volatile than large-cap value stocks. The level of volatility is also affected by industry sector. Also, international stocks are generally more volatile than domestic stocks.

The foregoing generalizations are intended only as such. It is important, when examining a fund for risk/reward characteristics, to analyze each fund on a case-by-case basis.

Caution: Funds that invest in derivatives face special risks. Derivatives – which come in many different types and have many different uses – are financial instruments whose performance is derived, at least in part, from the performance of an underlying asset, security or index. Their value can be affected dramatically by even small market movements, sometimes in unpredictable ways. However, they do not necessarily increase risk, and may in fact reduce risk. A fund’s prospectus will disclose how it may use derivatives. You may also want to call a fund and ask how it uses these instruments.

Summary

There are a number of sources of information that you should explore before investing in mutual funds. The most important of these is the prospectus, which is the fund’s selling document and contains information about costs, risks, past performance and the fund’s investment goals. Request the prospectus from the fund or from a financial professional if you are using one. Read the prospectus, and exercise your judgment carefully, before you invest.

Read the sections of the prospectus that discuss the risks, investment goals and investment policies of the fund you are considering. Funds of the same type can have significantly different risks, objectives and policies.

All mutual funds must prepare a Statement of Additional Information (SAI, also called Part B of the prospectus). It explains a fund’s operations in greater detail than the prospectus. If you ask, the fund must send you an SAI.

You can get a clearer picture of a fund’s investment goals and policies by reading its annual and semi-annual reports to shareholders. If you ask, the fund will send you these reports. You can also research funds at most libraries or by using an on-line service.

Government and Non-Profit Agencies

The SEC

Other sources of information filed with the SEC include public or law libraries, securities firms, financial service bureaus, computerized on-line services, and the companies themselves.

Most companies whose stock is traded over the counter or on a stock exchange must file “full disclosure” reports on a regular basis with the SEC. The annual report (Form 10-K) is the most comprehensive of these. It contains a narrative description and statistical information on the company’s business, operations, properties, parents, and subsidiaries; its management, including their compensation and ownership of
company securities: and significant legal proceedings which involve the company. Form 10-K also contains the audited financial statements of the company (including a balance sheet, an income statement, and a statement of cash flow) and provides management’s discussion of business operations and prospects for the future.

Quarterly financial information on Form 8-K may be required as well.

Anyone may obtain copies (at a modest copying charge) of any corporate report and most other documents filed with the Commission by visiting the SEC website

American Association of Individual Investors (offers an annual guide to low-load mutual funds):

625 North Michigan Avenue
Chicago, IL 60611
Tel: 800-428-2244

Investment Company Institute (a trade association of fund companies that publishes an annual directory of mutual funds):

1401 H Street NW, Suite 1200
Washington, DC 20005
Tel: 202-326-5800

Mutual Fund Education Alliance (publishes an annual guide to low-cost mutual funds:

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