Micro captives have returned to the Internal Revenue Service’s (IRS) annual ‘Dirty Dozen’ list of tax scams and abusive arrangements.
Having escaped the 2020 list for the first time in five years, taxpayers and financial institutions were once again warned of micro captives as a form of “abusive arrangements” promising significant tax deductions.
The list highlighted offshore micro captives as “lack[ing] the attributes of insurance” by insuring implausible risks or duplicating commercial coverage in order to avoid paying tax on underwriting income under section 831(b) of the US Tax Code.
Also included as part of the ‘Dirty Dozen’ were syndicated conservation easements, potential abuse of the US-Malta income tax treaty, improper claims of business credits for research and experimentation, and improper monetised installment sales.
This year’s list follows the recent creation of the Office of Promoter Investigations to coordinate service-wide enforcements against “abusive tax avoidance transactions”.
Chuck Rettig, commissioner of the IRS, warns, “We are stepping up our enforcement against abusive arrangements. The IRS recommends that anyone who participated in one of these abusive arrangements should consult independent counsel about coming into compliance.”
The 2021 ‘Dirty Dozen’ list also included scams related to the COVID-19 pandemic, such as stimulus cheque scams and unemployment compensation fraud.
