Tax practice

Swiss banks seeking to avoid U.S. prosecution by disclosing how they helped Americans evade taxes asked the Justice Department this week to back off a dozen demands, including that they cooperate with other nations.

Raoul Weil, who once ran UBS AG’s global wealth-management business, referred to accounts hidden by U.S. clients from the Internal Revenue Service as “toxic waste,” a witness at his tax-conspiracy trial said.

Individuals who lost money in the stock market in 2014 may have other investment assets that have appreciated in value. These taxpayers should consider the extent to which they should sell appreciated assets before year end (if their value has peaked) and thereby offset gains with pre-existing losses.

The Internal Revenue Service is planning to improve the technology used by its Taxpayer Advocate Service to better handle the many requests it receives from taxpayers seeking help with their IRS problems, but the project has been put on hold due to budget cuts.

The Internal Revenue Service needs to go to greater lengths to safeguard taxpayer information on health insurance exchanges, according to a new government report.

The Internal Revenue Service posted the annual cost-of-living adjustments for pension plans and other retirement plans for 2015, allowing taxpayers to contribute up to $18,000 in their 401(k) plans in 2015.

The average tax refund in 2014 was $2,696, up 1.5 percent from the average refund of $2,656 in 2013, according to a new report on how well the Internal Revenue Service operated last tax season.

The number of companies lobbying the U.S. government on tax inversions more than doubled in the quarter ending Sept. 30, as they sought to prevent Congress and the Obama administration from imposing new restrictions.

A bipartisan group of 15 senators has written to the Internal Revenue Service urging the agency to do a better job of preventing tax refund fraud using stolen identities.

The Internal Revenue Service’s Office of Safeguards is not doing enough to protect the federal tax information that it is required to disclose to other government agencies, according to a new report.

A majority of board members at public companies want Congress to pass broad-based tax reform legislation to address corporate tax inversions, according to a new survey.

The Internal Revenue Service will not meet the Treasury Department’s 2015 goal for full compliance with a directive requiring federal agencies to issue identification cards that allow workers to gain access to federally controlled facilities and information systems, according to a new government report that found IRS officials citing the lack of enough funding and staff as the main obstacles.

The Internal Revenue Service did not always issue a notice of its intent to issue a levy on taxpayer assets, according to a new report.

The federal government brought in $3.02 trillion in tax and other revenues in fiscal 2014 – its highest take ever.

The Internal Revenue Service needs to do more to prevent improper claims for refunds of excess Social Security tax withholding, according to a recent government report.

Some of our favorite recent tax fraud cases.

Our weekly roundup of tax-related investment strategies and news your clients may be thinking about.

Tax preparers charge an average of $142 for a preparing a 1040 and up to an average of $566 for an 1120, according to a new survey from the NATP.

The IRS announced that professional tax preparers can now register for or renew their PTINs on IRS.gov.

A former UBS AG executive gave a primer on the workings of Swiss bank secrecy to a Florida jury hearing the tax-conspiracy trial of Raoul Weil, who once ran the bank’s global wealth-management business.