Just when you thought tax rules could not get anymore confusing. IRS Clarifies Position on Wash Sales and IRAs

In Revenue Ruling 2008-5, the IRS has ruled that the wash sales rules apply when a taxpayer sells stock or other securities outside of an IRA for a loss, and purchases substantially identical stock or securities in an IRA (traditional or Roth) within 30 days before or after the sale. The result is that the loss on the sale of the stock or securities is disallowed. In addition, the taxpayer's basis in the IRA is not increased by the amount of the disallowed loss.

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Just when you think you've finally figured out your taxes, count on Congress to tweak the rules.

Keeping up with rapidly changing tax laws, phase-ins, phase-outs, regulations, revenue rulings and court decisions can be daunting even for veteran tax pros. Consider: The 2008 edition of CCH's comprehensive federal tax-law service contained more than 67,500 pages, up from 40,500 pages in 1995.

"A lot of the tax law is really quite hard -- and it can also be very counterintuitive," says Mel Schwarz, a partner and director of tax legislative affairs at Grant Thornton LLP in Washington.

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The Wall Street Journal headline really sets the tone for our marketing message this week.

It’s tax season, are you capitalizing on it?

Here’s a talking point for clients and a great lead for a marketing piece:

Zero Percent Federal Capital Gains Tax Rate Boon to Lower-Tax Bracket Investors

Investors in lower income tax brackets will pay no capital gains tax this year. For lower-tax bracket individuals, the long-term capital gains tax rate temporarily drops to 0% in 2008, 2009, and 2010 (in 2011, this rate reverts to 10%). This may be a signal for some investors to sell. Before you advise your clients, be sure you understand who qualifies and who doesn't.

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As I wrote that, it sounded like something from Star Trek. But it's not.

I'll let you in on a little secret. Large corporations have spent billions of dollars collecting information on consumers. They can tell you what their ideal client looks like and where to find them. So when they do their marketing, it is very targeted. Can you do the same?

We are excited to announce the launch of a new service that will do all of that for you!

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The easiest sales we ever closed were the clients who had problems that we could solve.

Check out these headlines from the last few weeks:

"U.S. stocks are off to the worst start to the year on record, according to key market measures"

"2007 may be a record year for capital gains distributions from mutual funds"

"The Fed is signaling that it will be lowering interest rates"

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If you're like most of us, you probably generated a lot of qualified prospects in 2007 that didn't become clients. Maybe they were folks who sent RSVP's for a seminar but didn't attend or didn't book an appointment afterwards. Whatever the source, and whatever the reason the qualified prospect slipped away, the bottom line is the same: if you didn’t make the conversion from prospect to client, it was a missed opportunity to cultivate new relationships and grow your business.

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Bill Gross, founder and chief investment officer of PIMCO, had a great article in Fortune last month. He described the "sub-prime" financial mess this way:

"The tangled web of sub-primes has claimed more than its share of victims in the last months; homeowners by the hundreds of thousands, to be sure, but also those who created, packaged, insured, distributed, and ultimately bought what should have been labeled "junk mortgages" but which by a masterstroke of marketing genius received more respectable imprimatur.

Skim milk masquerades as cream," warned Gilbert and Sullivan over a century ago, and sure enough, today's subprimes, packaged into financial conduits with monikers like SIIV's and CDO's, pretended to be AAA - cubes of butter."

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