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Monday, December 18, 2017

TOP NEWS

Top Federal Tax Cases Of 2017: Year-In-Review

This year resulted in some major setbacks in court for the Internal Revenue Service and the U.S. Department of the Treasury, including rulings that set aside anti-inversion regulations for violating the administrative law and siding with a Greek company over the taxation of foreign partners. Read more »

Final GOP Tax Bill Settles On 21% Corporate Rate

Republicans unveiled the final version of their tax cut bill on Friday that would impose a 21 percent flat rate on corporations, set the maximum individual tax rate at 37 percent and largely adopt the Senate’s proposal for pass-through businesses. Read more »

IRS Floats Tiered Partnership Rules Under New Audit Regime

The IRS on Friday released highly anticipated guidance on a new partnership tax audit regime to address, among other things, how tax adjustments should be taken into account by so-called tiered partnerships that have pass-through entities as partners. Read more »

9th Circ. Agrees Inventor's Royalties Are Not Capital Gains

A partially split Ninth Circuit panel held Friday that an inventor's $7 million in patent royalties do not count as capital gains under federal tax law, upholding a U.S. Tax Court decision and rejecting his appeal. Read more »

MVP: Covington's Jeremy Spector

Jeremy Spector, whose tax practice at Covington & Burling LLP singularly and uniquely focuses on representing the sports industry, landed a spot among the five Law360 Tax MVPs of 2017 after he won a precedent-setting case for the Boston Bruins, advised the Mexican Football Federation in its joint bid with U.S. and Canadian soccer federations to host the World Cup, and emerged victorious in a string of IRS audits. Read more »

FEDERAL

Manafort To Get Off House Arrest If He Pledges Real Estate

Indicted former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort will be let off of house arrest once he signs agreements to forfeit four properties allegedly worth over $11 million if he does not show up to court, among other conditions, a D.C. federal judge ruled Friday. Read more »

Gov't Tax Dispute Over FBI Office Space Will Go To Trial

A dispute between the General Services Administration and the owner of a Washington, D.C., commercial building over the government’s tax obligation for rented office space must go to trial, a U.S. Court of Federal Claims judge said Thursday. Read more »

House, Trump Admin, States Settle ACA Subsidy Battle

The Trump administration, the U.S. House of Representatives and 17 states embroiled in a legal battle over billions of dollars in Affordable Care Act subsidies have agreed to settle a dispute currently pending before the D.C. Circuit, according to an agreement filed in federal court Friday. Read more »

Trump's ACA Birth Control Waivers Blocked By Pa. Judge

A Pennsylvania federal judge on Friday temporarily blocked the Trump administration’s rules dialing back the Affordable Care Act’s contraception mandate through religious or moral exemptions for employers, saying the federal government failed to follow proper procedures in implementing the policies. Read more »

Ex-IRS Atty Cops To 'Breaking Bad,' Shipping Meth In Mail

A former attorney for the Internal Revenue Service and onetime Debevoise & Plimpton LLP associate who “broke bad” admitted on Friday to conspiring to ship distribution levels of methamphetamine to Long Island, New York, from his apartment in Washington, D.C. Read more »

STATE & LOCAL

Top State & Local Tax Cases Of 2017: Year-In-Review

Most tax professionals likely will remember 2017 as a year dominated by federal tax reform, but several hotly contested state and local tax disputes garnered their own degree of fame and fallout. Read more »

INTERNATIONAL

Luxembourg To Appeal €250M Amazon Tax Recovery Order

Luxembourg’s finance ministry said Friday that it had decided to appeal a state aid decision handed down by the European Union’s antitrust enforcer earlier this year that ordered the country to recover €250 million ($294 million) in corporate income taxes from Amazon.com Inc. Read more »

Amazon Pays Italy €100M To Settle Tax Claims

The Italian revenue agency Agenzia delle Entrate said on Friday it reached an agreement with Amazon.com Inc., in which the online retailer will settle allegations that it avoided paying taxes in the country. Read more »

UK Litigation Roundup: Here's What You Missed In London

The last week has seen more than 100 individuals sue Ingenious Media Holdings Ltd. amid disputes over the tax treatment of its film investments; Zinc Hotels lodge another challenge against BayernLB, this time adding Hilton Worldwide; and security firm G4S bring a claim over its pension scheme. Here, Law360 looks at those and other new claims in the U.K. Read more »

PEOPLE

Taxation With Representation: Skadden, Cravath, Shearman

In this week’s Taxation With Representation, Disney shelled out $52.4 billion for 21st Century Fox’s film and television studios, Unibail snapped up Westfield for $15.7 billion, and Corning bought most of 3M’s communication markets business for $900 million. Read more »

EXPERT ANALYSIS

Alternative Fees: My Experience At Bartlit Beck

Bartlit Beck was a wonderful place to work for 18 years, and the lawyers there are not only excellent attorneys but also great people. That said, and stating my biases upfront, it is possible for me to look analytically at the Bartlit Beck fee model and make some observations on the pros and cons of one version of alternative fees, says J.B. Heaton, founder of investment analytics company Conjecture LLC. Read more »

Opinion

Jurors Should Have An Active Role In Trials

We tell jurors how important they are to the successful implementation of our judicial system, but oftentimes we don’t treat them with the reverence they deserve. U.S. District Judge Amos Mazzant III of the Eastern District of Texas, Lisa Blue of Baron and Blue, and Robert Hirschhorn of Cathy E. Bennett & Associates advocate three improvements to give jurors an active role in our civil and criminal jury trials. Read more »

LEGAL INDUSTRY

2nd Circ. Gets Kozinski Sex Probe Amid New Reports

Federal court leaders moved quickly Friday to answer accusations of inappropriate sexual behavior by U.S. Circuit Judge Alex Kozinski, sending a misconduct investigation to an oversight council at the Second Circuit amid new reports that brought the total number of public accusers to 15. Read more »

Litigation Attorney Hiring To Tick Up In 2018

Litigation is expected to be a bright spot in an otherwise lackluster legal hiring market during the first six months of 2018, a survey of 200 law firm and corporate legal department hiring professionals has found. Read more »

Law Firm Diversity Is Uneven Across US Cities

African-American and other minority lawyers continue to be underrepresented in U.S. law firms, a nationwide report released Thursday has found, but the failure to build a diverse workforce is much more stark in some cities, such as Boston, than in others, such as Miami. Read more »

Social Media Can Create Confidentiality Exception, ABA Says

The fact that a piece of information about a former client is publicly available doesn’t necessarily mean it’s not subject to the lawyer’s duty to keep their confidences close, according to a Friday opinion from the American Bar Association. Read more »

GC Cheat Sheet: The Hottest Corporate News Of The Week

Experts shared with Law360 tips for helping employers keep the holiday festivities merry while limiting their legal risk, President Donald Trump tapped the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission's Chai Feldblum for a new term and two Senate Democrats challenged the National Labor Relations Board's new general counsel. These are some of the top stories in corporate legal news you may have missed this past week. Read more »

In Case You Missed It: Hottest Firms And Stories On Law360

For those who missed out, here's a look back at the law firms, stories and expert analyses that generated the most buzz on Law360 last week. Read more »

Q&A

A Chat With Orrick COO Laura Saklad

In this new monthly series, legal recruiting experts Amanda Brady and Amy Mallow of Major Lindsey & Africa interview law firm management from Am Law 200 firms about how they are navigating an increasingly competitive business environment. The first conversation is with Laura Saklad, chief operations officer for Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP. Read more »

Podcast

Law360's Pro Say: What’s Next For Net Neutrality?

On the latest episode of Law360's Pro Say podcast, the team discusses the Federal Communications Commission's rollback of net neutrality rules, a Ninth Circuit judge accused of sexual harassment, two judicial nominees that have reached a dead end in the Senate, and how to have a festive holiday party without inviting legal trouble. Read more »

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