Department of the Treasury 2009 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

This document contains proposed regulations relating to the exclusion from gross income for amounts received on account of personal physical injuries or physical sickness. The proposed regulations reflect amendments under the Small Business Job Protection Act of 1996. The proposed regulations also delete the requirement that to qualify for exclusion from gross income, damages received from a legal suit, action, or settlement agreement must be based upon ``tort or tort type rights.'' The proposed regulations affect taxpayers receiving damages on account of personal physical injuries or physical sickness and taxpayers paying these damages.

The Department of the Treasury, as part of its continuing effort to reduce paperwork and respondent burden, invites the general public and other Federal agencies to take this opportunity to comment on proposed and/or continuing information collections, as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, Public Law 104-13 (44 U.S.C. 3506(c)(2)(A)). Currently, the IRS is soliciting comments concerning an existing final regulation, LR-311-81 (T.D. 7924), Penalties for Underpayment of Deposits and Overstated Deposit Claims, and Time for Filing Information Returns of Owners, Officers and Directors of Foreign Corporations (section 1.6046-1).

Treasury recently raised the customer confirmation reporting requirement threshold amount from $750 million to $2 billion for all Treasury marketable securities auctions. This final rule amends Treasury's auction rules to conform to the new $2 billion threshold amount.

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (Board), Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), and the Office of Thrift Supervision (OTS) (collectively, the agencies) are requesting comment on a proposal to modify their general risk-based and advanced risk-based capital adequacy frameworks to eliminate the exclusion of certain consolidated asset-backed commercial paper programs from risk-weighted assets and provide a reservation of authority in their general risk-based and advanced risk-based capital adequacy frameworks to permit the agencies to require banking organizations to treat entities that are not consolidated under accounting standards as if they were consolidated for risk-based capital purposes, commensurate with the risk relationship of the banking organization to the structure. The agencies are issuing this proposal and request for comment to better align capital requirements with the actual risk of certain exposures and to obtain information and views from the public on the effect on regulatory capital that will result from the implementation of the Financial Accounting Standard Board's (FASB) Statement of Financial Accounting Standards No. 166, Accounting for Transfers of Financial Assets, an Amendment of FASB Statement No. 140 and Statement of Financial Accounting Standards No. 167, Amendments to FASB Interpretation No. 46(R).

In the Rules and Regulations section of this issue of the Federal Register, the IRS is issuing temporary regulations clarifying that a single-owner eligible entity that is disregarded as an entity separate from its owner for any purpose, but regarded as a separate entity for certain excise tax purposes, is treated as a corporation for tax administration purposes related to those excise taxes. Those regulations also make conforming changes to the tax liability rule for disregarded entities and the treatment of entity rule for disregarded entities with respect to employment taxes. The regulations affect disregarded entities in general and, in particular, disregarded entities that pay or pay over certain federal excise taxes or that are required to be registered by the IRS. The text of those temporary regulations also serves as the text of these proposed regulations.

The Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control (``OFAC'') is publishing the names of two additional entities and six additional individuals whose property and interests in property have been blocked pursuant to the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act (``Kingpin Act'') (21 U.S.C. 1901-1908, 8 U.S.C. 1182).

This document contains proposed regulations that provide rules relating to the disclosure of listed transactions and transactions of interest with respect to the generation-skipping transfer tax under section 6011 of the Internal Revenue Code (Code), conforming amendments under sections 6111 and 6112, and rules relating to the preparation and maintenance of lists with respect to reportable transactions under section 6112. The regulations affect taxpayers participating in listed transactions and transactions of interest and material advisors to such transactions. The proposed regulations also contain rules under section 6112 that affect material advisors to reportable transactions. These regulations provide guidance regarding the length of time a material advisor has to prepare the list that must be maintained after the list maintenance requirement first arises with respect to a reportable transaction. These regulations also clarify guidance regarding designation agreements.

The Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (``OFAC'') is amending the Sudanese Sanctions Regulations by issuing a general license that authorizes the exportation and reexportation of agricultural commodities, medicine, and medical devices to the Specified Areas of Sudan, as well as the conduct of related transactions. The Specified Areas of Sudan are defined as Southern Sudan, Southern Kordofan/Nuba Mountains State, Blue Nile State, Abyei, Darfur, and marginalized areas in and around Khartoum. OFAC also is making conforming changes to the Sudanese Sanctions Regulations to reflect this authorization.

This document contains corrections to final regulations (TD 9456) that were published in the Federal Register on Tuesday, August 4, 2009 (74 FR 38830) providing guidance regarding the treatment of controlled services transactions under section 482 and the allocation of income from intangible property, in particular with respect to contributions by a controlled party to the value of intangible property owned by another controlled party. These final regulations modify regulations under section 861 concerning stewardship expenses to be consistent with the changes made to the guidance under section 482.

An open meeting of the Area 1 Taxpayer Advocacy Panel will be conducted. The Taxpayer Advocacy Panel is soliciting public comments, ideas and suggestions on improving customer service at the Internal Revenue Service.

An open meeting of the Taxpayer Advocacy Panel Joint Committee will be conducted. The Taxpayer Advocacy Panel is soliciting public comment, ideas, and suggestions on improving customer service at the Internal Revenue Service.

An open meeting of the Area 6 Taxpayer Advocacy Panel will be conducted. The Taxpayer Advocacy Panel is soliciting public comment, ideas, and suggestions on improving customer service at the Internal Revenue Service.

An open meeting of the Area 4 Taxpayer Advocacy Panel will be conducted. The Taxpayer Advocacy Panel is soliciting public comments, ideas, and suggestions on improving customer service at the Internal Revenue Service.

An open meeting of the Taxpayer Advocacy Panel Taxpayer Assistance Center Committee will be conducted. The Taxpayer Advocacy Panel is soliciting public comments, ideas, and suggestions on improving customer service at the Internal Revenue Service.

An open meeting of the Taxpayer Advocacy Panel Multi-Lingual Initiatives Issue Committee will be conducted. The Taxpayer Advocacy Panel is soliciting public comment, ideas, and suggestions on improving customer service at the Internal Revenue Service.

An open meeting of the Taxpayer Advocacy Panel Notice Improvement Issue Committee will be conducted. The Taxpayer Advocacy Panel is soliciting public comments, ideas and suggestions on improving customer service at the Internal Revenue Service.

An open meeting of the Area 2 Taxpayer Advocacy Panel will be conducted. The Taxpayer Advocacy Panel is soliciting public comments, ideas, and suggestions on improving customer service at the Internal Revenue Service.

This document contains final regulations providing guidance on employer comparable contributions to Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) under section 4980G of the Internal Revenue Code (Code) as amended by sections 302, 305 and 306 of the Tax Relief and Health Care Act of 2006 (the Act). The final regulations also provide guidance relating to the manner and method of reporting and paying the excise tax under sections 4980B, 4980D, 4980E, and 4980G of the Code. These final regulations would affect employers that contribute to employees' HSAs and Archer MSAs, employers or employee organizations that sponsor a group health plan, and certain third parties such as insurance companies or HMOs or third-party administrators who are responsible for providing benefits under the plan.

The Department of the Treasury, as part of its continuing effort to reduce paperwork and respondent burden, invites the general public and other Federal agencies to take this opportunity to comment on proposed and/or continuing information collections, as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, Public Law 104-13 (44 U.S.C. 3506(c)(2)(A)). Currently, the IRS is soliciting comments concerning REG-109512-05, Information Returns Required with Respect to Certain Foreign Corporations and Certain Foreign-Owned Domestic Corporations.

The Department of the Treasury, as part of its continuing effort to reduce paperwork and respondent burden, invites the general public and other Federal agencies to take this opportunity to comment on proposed and/or continuing information collections, as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, Public Law 104-13 (44 U.S.C. 3506(c)(2)(A)). Currently, the IRS is soliciting comments concerning Notice 2006-52, Deduction for Energy Efficient Commercial Buildings.

This document contains temporary regulations under section 1502 of the Internal Revenue Code (Code). The change to the consolidated return regulations is necessary in light of the regulations under section 368 that were issued in October 2007