Shaking things up in state and local tax
Shaking things up in state and local tax
The Maine Supreme Judicial Court recently held that a taxpayer was not entitled to alternative apportionment for approximately $3 billion in gains earned from the sale of a business unit.
The taxpayer was a food and beverage manufacturer that sold its frozen pizza division in 2010 for $3.6 billion. The taxpayer took the position on…
The Tennessee Court of Appeals held that a manufacturer’s proceeds from a legal malpractice action are business earnings subject to the Tennessee excise tax. The malpractice action arose when the taxpayer’s attorneys improperly filed a European patent. The damages awarded in settlement of the claim were based on profits the taxpayer would have earned if…
Oral argument was held June 11 in the highly unusual case of Synthes USA HQ Inc. v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.
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The Michigan Supreme Court held that revenue from the performance of services must be sourced to the location where the service provider’s employees performed the work, not where the services were delivered, for purposes of the City of Detroit’s income tax. Detroit imposes an income tax under the Uniform City Income Tax Ordinance (“UCITO”), which…
On February 28, 2020, the Oregon Tax Court held that multiple airlines operating as a unitary business should aggregate not only transportation revenue but also other metrics, such as departure ratios, that are factored into the apportionment formula used by Oregon for airline taxpayers. Oregon regulations provide a modified single sales factor apportionment rule for…
The Texas Supreme Court held that a defense contractor was entitled to a refund of franchise tax because it had incorrectly sourced certain sales of military aircraft made to foreign governments to Texas on its originally-filed returns for the 2005 through 2007 tax years. The contractor produced military aircraft in Texas, which it sold to…
The New York State Tax Appeals Tribunal affirmed a New York State Division of Tax Appeals determination denying a refund claim to a taxpayer that sought to apply the income sourcing rules for registered broker-dealers to receipts from its separate investment advisory business. The taxpayer structured its broker-dealer operations and investment advisory operations into two…
The Florida Department of Revenue determined that a platform software company should source its income from user fees and from its sale of services on a market basis, based on the location of the customer to which the services are provided. The platform software company provided a platform for developers to create and sell software…
The Washington Court of Appeals held that Seattle’s method of apportioning the City’s business and occupation tax (B&O tax) was unconstitutionally applied and unfairly apportioned when the City excluded compensation paid to independent representatives from the apportionment payroll factor. The taxpayer, a financial services firm headquartered in Seattle, generated most of its income through the…
The Michigan Court of Appeals recently held that the state’s statutory apportionment formula was unconstitutionally distortive as applied to a taxpayer’s Michigan Business Tax (MBT) liability. Therefore, the taxpayer was entitled to use an alternative formula. The court noted that this is an exceptional case where the taxpayer met its burden to show that the…
