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Archives for October 2018

New Tax Benefits for Pass-Through Entities – What’s There to Know?

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By FJV Tax Staff

There is a great new tax benefit available courtesy of tax reform that our pass-through clients don’t seem to know much about.  That great new benefit is IRC Code §199A (“Section 199A”) which provides owners of pass-through businesses, most notably partnerships and S corporations, with an important new tax benefit from a qualified trade or business.

This deduction is for up to 20% of the qualified business income of a U.S. business that is either a sole proprietorship, partnership, S corporation, trust, or estate.  For taxpayers with taxable income that exceeds $315,000 for a married couple filing jointly or $157,500 for all other taxpayers, the deduction is subject to limitations such as the type of business, the taxpayer’s taxable income, the total amount of W-2 wages paid by the business or the unadjusted basis of qualified property held by the business.

The motivation for the new deduction is rather simple.  It allows pass-through businesses maintain tax benefits commensurate with the significant corporate tax cut also provided by tax reform.  Income earned by a C corporation has always been subject to double taxation.  The first level of tax is at the entity level and the second is at the shareholder level when the corporation distributes its income as a dividend.  Tax reform reduced the entity-level tax imposed on C corporations from a top rate of 35% to a flat rate of 21%.  Tax reform did retain the top rate on dividend income of 20% but the significant decrease in the corporate-level tax lowered the top combined federal rate on income earned by a C corporation and distributed to shareholders as a dividend from 48% to 36.8%.

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In contrast to a C corporation, income earned by sole proprietorships, S corporations, or partnerships is subject to only a single level of tax at the shareholder level.  Owners of these businesses report their share of the business’s income directly on their tax return – Form 1040 – and pay the corresponding tax at ordinary individual rates.  Tax reform reduced the top rate on ordinary income of individuals from 39.6% to 37% and Section 199A further reduced the effective top rate on qualified business income earned by owners of sole proprietorships, S corporations, and partnerships to 29.6%.

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What is most important here is that owners of sole proprietorships, S corporations, and partnerships retained a significant federal tax rate advantage over owners of a C corporation that they enjoyed prior to the enactment of the new law.

While the purpose of Sec. 199A is clear, its statutory construction and legislative text is anything but clear.  As a result, Sec. 199A has created ample controversy since its enactment with many tax advisers anticipating that until further guidance is issued the uncertainty surrounding the provision will lead to countless disputes between taxpayers and the IRS.  Adding concern is Congress lowered the threshold where any taxpayer claiming the deduction can be subject to a substantial-understatement penalty.  What that means is that they’ve introduced an ambiguous new rule and lowered the margin of error for penalties.

One of the areas giving our clients problems is figuring out exactly what types of business activities are excluded from the 20% deduction.  Service businesses are the real problem.  Section 199A defined specified service business – for which no deduction is allowed once a taxpayer’s taxable income exceed $415,000 for taxpayers filing jointly or $207,500 for all other taxpayers – as “any trade or business involving the performance of services in the fields of health, law, accounting, actuarial science, performing arts, consulting, athletics, financial services, brokerage services, or any trade or business where the principal asset of such trade or business is the reputation or skill of one or more of its employees or owners”.  That definition cast a pretty wide shadow.

Proposed regulations have come to the rescue at least a little bit.  The proposed regulations clarified several questions related to specified service businesses.  First, there is a de minimis exception that allows a business that sells products and provides a service to escape classification as a specified service business if gross receipts are less than $25 million for the year and less than 10% of total gross receipts are from the performance of services in one of the specified services business listed above.  Next, the proposed regulations provide guidance on the meaning of various trades or businesses described in Section 199A as specified service business.  These rules are meant to help define who qualifies for the benefits in businesses where the lines are blurry between qualifying and non-qualifying activities.

Some of the most complicated areas are services related to health, consulting, and real estate businesses.  Here are examples of the application of Section 199A from each of these businesses:

Health and Health Care

A qualifying health care business means the provision of medical services by physicians, pharmacists, nurses, dentists, veterinarians, physical therapists, psychologists, and other similar healthcare professionals who provide medical services directly to a patient.  It excludes the provision of service not directly related to a medical field even though services logically may relate to the health of the service recipient.  An example of these non-qualifying activities would be the operation of a health club or health spa that provides exercise or conditioning to customers or payment processing services for health care providers.

Consulting

Section 199A excludes consulting services defined as the provision of professional advice and guidance to clients to assist in achieving goals and solving problems.  However, these services do not disqualify larger businesses that only involve small levels of consulting.  Disqualified consulting does not include salespeople who provide training or education courses as an auxiliary service to the sale of product.  For example, a construction contractor who provides consultation as part of a home remodeling project is not considered a consultant.

Real Estate

Brokerage services are specifically excluded from Section 199A benefits.  This includes services provided by stock brokers, investment managers, and other similar professionals but does not include services provided by real estate agents and brokers or insurance agents or brokers.  The proposed regulations clarify that the performance of investing and managing real property services are not included in this definition which allows real estate professionals in the trade or business or managing real property to qualify for the deduction.

As one can see, Section 199A provides a tremendous benefit to owners of sole proprietorships, S corporations, and partnerships.  As this post makes clear, granting a 20% deduction to pass-through business owners is far easier in concept than it is in execution.  Many questions still remain.

Until time evolves and provides everyone with the guidance needed, taxpayers must still move forward and claim the benefits they’re entitled to.  To understand and claim the benefits that you’re entitled to please contact us at fjvtax.com and let us guide you to your benefits.

Transfer Pricing for Small & Mid-Size Business – What is Important Now and Why

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Frank J. Vari, JD, MTax, CPA

One of the most common questions we at FJV receive from our small business clients is what is transfer pricing and why must we address it now?  Many clients – and some practitioners – seek an answer but are overwhelmed by the complex and conflicting information generally available.

If your company plans to expand business operations into the U.S. or expand their U.S. operations into another country at least a basic understanding of transfer pricing is required.  Once there is a basic understanding, one can better comply with the legally mandated transfer pricing rules and then create a strategic pricing plan.

To best explain, let’s discuss transfer pricing basics, pricing methods, and documentation requirements.

Transfer Pricing Basics

A “transfer price” is the price at which related companies located in different countries buy and sell goods and services to each other.  This is very important to each country’s taxing authority as each country wants to tax a share of these worldwide profits.  “Transfer pricing” is generally defined as the legal mechanism that allocates the profit from that related party sale between the competing tax jurisdictions without creating double taxation.  This mechanism, as outlined in a variety of laws around the world, allocates global supply chain profits based upon the functions and risks of the related parties.  The party which performs the most important and costly functions, e.g., design and manufacturing, and takes the greatest risk, e.g., capital investment and customer credit risks, is entitled to the greater profit.

For example, let’s assume a U.S. entity manufactures medical equipment and sells it to a related party located in Germany.  The German entity then resells the equipment to its customers within Germany.  The financial elements here are as follows:

  • The medical equipment is manufactured in the U.S. at a cost of $10,000.
  • The parent sells this equipment to its German relative for $17,000 realizing a taxable profit in the U.S. of $7,000.
  • The German entity then resells this same equipment to an unrelated German customer for $20,000 thus realizing a taxable German profit of $3,000.
  • The total taxable profit for the entire global supply chain is $10,000.

How can the U.S. entity justify receiving 70% of the taxable profits, while the German entity only 30%?  In our example, the U.S. entity has performed the costly research, design, and manufacturing functions for the medical equipment.  The German subsidiary is only involved in the local German marketing and distribution of the product which requires little capital or investment.  Thus, the U.S. entity has performed the greater functions and taken the greater risk which legally entitles them to the greater profit.

This profit split may be challenged by either the U.S. or German tax authorities using their own local transfer pricing laws.  However, almost every country, including the U.S. and Germany, requires that each related taxpayer perform and document a transfer pricing analysis of their taxable profit allocation with related parties.  No exceptions.

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Transfer Pricing Methods

The IRS first enacted rules back in 1928 to address intercompany profit allocations that have evolved into present-day IRC Code §482.  These rules actually empower the IRS to reallocate income or deductions between related parties to prevent tax evasion.  If the taxpayer doesn’t perform a properly documented allocation or get it right the IRS will do it for them.  Not a good place to be for sure.

IRC Code §482 requires taxpayers to create and document a transfer pricing policy that chooses the best method to justify the transfer price of goods and services.  The IRS allows various methods for various types of transactions.  Transfers of heavy equipment, software, and consulting services are all sufficiently different that different pricing methods are required.

One of the most common pricing methods – and the one most preferred by the IRS and other taxing authorities – is the Comparable Uncontrolled Price (“CUP”) methodology.  In our example, let’s assume our U.S. entity also sells the same type of medical equipment to unrelated Chinese and Australian customers for more than it sells to the German related party.  The IRS may – and probably will – argue that the U.S. entity is not charging Germany enough and a greater U.S. taxable profit should be reported.  Alternatively, if the U.S. entity sells the medical equipment to all three customers, both related an unrelated, for the same price it could justify the intercompany transfer price between the related U.S. and German entities as an “arm’s-length” price.

IRC Code §482 provides other methods besides the CUP to be used for transfer pricing of goods and services.  These methods include the Cost Plus method, the Resale Price method, the Comparable Profits method, and the Profit Split method.  Taxpayers can even use an unspecified method if they can support it.  Taxpayers must be careful to analyze each of those methods separately and select the “best method” for that particular transaction in order to comply with IRC Code §482.

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Documentation Requirements & Penalties

One very important and often overlooked rule is that taxpayers are required to prepare and maintain contemporaneous documentation that explains in a very detailed and technical manner their transfer pricing methodologies.  “Contemporaneous” means this documentation must be compiled at the same time their U.S. tax return is filed.  If the IRS requests this documentation, the taxpayer must produce it within 30 days of an IRS request.  If the taxpayer fails to do so, two very bad things can happen.  First, as noted above, the IRS will go ahead and allocate the related party profits as they see fit.  Second, the taxpayer will be subject to the documentation penalty provisions of IRC Code §6662.

If the IRS makes a transfer pricing adjustment resulting in an underpayment of tax and the documentation requirement was not met, IRC Code §6662 permits IRS to impose a 20% or 40% percent non-deductible penalty.  The 20% penalty applies if the transfer price adjustment exceeds the lesser of $5 million or 10% of the taxpayer’s gross receipts.  If the transfer price adjustment exceeds the lesser of $20 million or 20% of the taxpayer’s gross receipts the IRS may impose a 40% penalty on the adjustment.

Besides proper transfer pricing documentation, U.S. taxpayers must comply with other important requirements including:

  • U.S. taxpayers who have related party transactions with their subsidiaries located outside of the U.S. must report these transactions on Form 5471.
  • U.S. taxpayers who have related party transactions with their foreign owners and their related parties must report these transactions on Form 5472.
  • If the related party sale involves a customs or duty filing, the price on the filing must be the same as that reported in the transfer pricing documentation and the Form 5471 or 5572. The failure to “harmonize” these filings can lead to additional penalties.

These are very harsh penalties that are often incurred by U.S. taxpayers who do not perform written transfer pricing studies to properly allocate or report related party profits.  The problem is there is really no way around them for small taxpayers.  Small taxpayers around the world have long called for exemptions from transfer pricing reporting but there is no significant relief to date.

Conclusion

Transfer pricing is a complicated issue that must be addressed proactively.  If properly addressed in a timely manner, transfer pricing can be addressed at a reasonable cost.  If not, the penalties kick in and the cost of these penalties coupled with the legal and professional fees of a transfer pricing conflict with any tax authority can be very high.

Our advice to any client with related party transactions that cross a foreign border is to proactively address their transfer pricing issues in a timely manner.  Whether they sell tangible property, services, or sell or license intangible property, our advice is the same.  At the end of the day, it saves our clients time and money and brings them fully into compliance with the law.

Frank J. Vari, JD, MTax, CPA is the practice leader of FJV Tax which is a CPA firm specializing in complex international and U.S. tax planning.  FJV Tax has offices in Wellesley and Boston.  The author can be reached via email at frank.vari@fjvtax.com or telephone at 617-770-7286/800-685-2324.  You can learn more about FJV Tax at fjvtax.com.