Description: Almost 65 years ago, the Supreme Court issued its opinion in Helvering v. Le Gierse, addressing when an arrangement should be recognized as involving “insurance” for federal income tax purposes. According to the Court, an “insurance risk” must be present, and for an insurance risk to exist, there must be “risk-shifting and risk distribution.”

Description: Update to initial article in Sept. 2007 issue, because of two new revenue rulings: Rev. Rul. 2007-54, 2007-38 I.R.B. 604 and Rev. Rul. 2007-61, 2007-42 I.R.B. 799.

Description: Illustrates the lack of clarity about how the various grandfather clauses applicable to life insurance contracts should be applied in practice.

Description: The recent Tax Technical Corrections Act of 2007, Pub. L. 110-172, signed into law on Dec. 29, 2007, includes a provision that permits a taxpayer to select positions in a straddle and thereby avoid surprise applications of the straddle rules by the IRS on audit.

Description: Two relatively recent developments have heightened tax managers’ anxiety concerning the possible disclosure of tax accrual workpapers.

Description: Comparison of statutory and tax accounting rules in treatment of non-performing assets.

Description: After nearly a decade of work by ACLI and representatives of its member companies, the Society of Actuaries SOA, the American Academy of Actuaries Academy, and the NAIC’s Life and Health Actuarial Task Force LHATF, on Sept. 24, 2008, the NAIC adopted a new actuarial guideline for applying the method of computing statutory reserves for variable annuity contracts AG VACARVM.

Description: This article highlights the achievements and successes of the section in 2008.

Description: This article discusses the temporary waiver and how it provides only limited relief from the section 401a9 minimum distribution requirements.

Description: This editorial highlights the hot topics happening in the tax industry today.