Farm Leadership
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Very Limited Availability for AICPA Ag Conference
This post is primarily for our CPA readers out there. I was just informed yesterday that there is extremely limited availability for the AICPA Ag Conference that will be held in Austin on May 7 to May 9. If you are interested in attending, here is the link on the AICPA site to sign up. […]
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Leave a Legacy (#44)
I had the privilege about two weeks ago to make a quick trip to the Kansas City area to do taping for Leave a Legacy. Leave a Legacy is a Farm Journal Media presentation focused on succession planning for farmers and is headed by Kevin Spafford. About three years ago, I had taped an inside episode […]
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Taxpayer Victory in Frank Aragona Trust Case
The US Tax Court released today their long anticipated decision in the Frank Aragona Trust case. The background on the case is as follows: The Frank Aragona Trust was formed by Frank Aragona during his lifetime and after his death, the trustees of the trust were his five children plus an independent trustee. Three of the children […]
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One More Reason Why Tax Reform is Going After Cash Method
The IRS issues data regarding income tax information for filers every year. I ran across a posting on the net farm income and loss reported by Schedule F farmers for 2011 and 2012. During each of these years, the USDA estimated that farmers had net farm income in excess of $120 billion. However, on schedule […]
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FSA Releases New Farm Bill Fact Sheet
The FSA released today a six page fact sheet on the new farm bill. It recaps the major changes that were included in the 900+ page farm bill. Most of the material has been covered on several of our posts over the last month or so. We are doing a webinar on the new farm bill […]
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Cash Rents Equals Extra 3.8% on Sale
We had a reader ask the following question: “Can you give some advice on the impact of retiring from active farming and cash renting the farm as it relates to the 3.8% tax on capital gains. Given a large increase in the land value while actively farming, do you give up the exemption from the […]
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Real Estate Includes Land but Not For Depreciation Purposes
We had a reader send in the following comments and question: “I appreciated your information on the tax reform proposal. In your 4th bullet point on depreciation, you stated that “Most if almost all farm real estate…would be over 40 years and not the current 10 or 20 years.” It has been my understanding that […]
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A Bad Day in Court
The Tax Court today released the Kaplan case. Gary Kaplan was a professional sports bookie. He started his career in the US and then moved it to the Caribbean before finally settling in Costa Rica. During this time, he formed a company called BetOnSports PLC. This company became the most successful overseas sports booking company […]
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When to Report Hedging Gains and Losses?
We had a reader send in the following questions: “We have an accrual basis farm partnership, for income statement purposes we have used the mark to market approach to the value of the hedge which was at a gain. For income tax purposes can we report the gain or loss when the hedge is closed?” […]
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Labor Department asks Judge to Overturn ‘Hot Goods’ Ruling
Updating an earlier post regarding “hot goods,” the U.S. Labor Department claims a judge committed legal error by overturning “hot goods” settlements between the agency and Oregon farmers. According to the U.S. Labor Department, the judge accepted “unsupported allegations at face value” from the farmers when he ruled the deals should be revoked. The ruling’s […]