Last week, the IRS issued new guidance that addresses “telescoping” in mutual agreement procedure (“MAP”) and advance pricing agreement (“APA”) cases. Very generally, the guidance disallows (subject to a $10 million materiality exception) telescoping for tax years starting in 2018, when the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (“TCJA”) came into effect, while continuing to allow telescoping for pre-2018 years in appropriate cases. According to the IRS’s Advance Pricing and Mutual Agreement (“APMA”) program, the new guidance was needed to address the impact of the TCJA “and its many interlocking provisions that require careful determination (and redetermination, as needed) of a U.S. taxpayer’s taxable income and tax attributes.” The new guidance has the potential to drive up compliance costs by increasing the number of tax returns that taxpayers must file to resolve MAP and APA resolutions for post-TCJA years (and resolutions spanning both pre- and post-TCJA years).

Continue Reading Telescoping into the Void

The Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore (“IRAS”) has issued transfer pricing guidelines for companies affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, which includes guidance on documentation requirements, term-testing for related party transactions and Advance Pricing Arrangements (“APA”).

Continue Reading Singapore’s Transfer Pricing Guidelines for COVID-Affected Businesses

Responding to the potential disruption created by COVID-19 for transfer pricing arrangements, the Advance Pricing & Mutual Agreement (“APMA”) Program on May 11, 2020, issued informal guidance related to the pandemic. The guidance makes clear that APMA will consider the impact of COVID-19 on both pending requests and completed agreements. It also reveals that APMA is already discussing COVID-19 issues with treaty partners.

Continue Reading COVID-19 and APAs: APMA Signals Flexible Case-by-Case Approach to Address Special 2020 Transfer Pricing Challenges in APAs