During the 2020 tax season, the singular phrase that was overheard reminded me that I had not started a blog yet on the funny things heard towards the end of any filing season – whether it is the spring filing season (the main one) or this mini one here that deals with returns on extensions, …
Last week I was visiting with a friend of mine who runs a family-owned business in Colorado. I have historically removed myself from any financial or tax discussions with him as they have used the same local advisor for many years. However, as we were visiting the new local brewery the topic of taxation came …
Unfortunately, due to COVID-19, a lot of individuals have had to make the difficult decision to close their businesses. Closing a corporation legally has several steps and boxes to check to make sure the business is permanently closed. A corporation is a separate tax-paying entity with shareholders who own capital stock. S corporations are corporations …
I think most tax professionals would agree, one of the last phrases you want to hear in regards to a tax return is “I think we have basis issues.” Definitely no bueno. But what exactly is basis anyway, and why is it so important? Basis is essentially the amount of money that a taxpayer has …
Net operating losses – known as NOLs in the tax professional world – are tax attributes generated when losses allocated from business activities exceed a taxpayer’s income for the year. While common sense might tell you that one generally wouldn’t want to be in a net operating loss position, as that would indicate you are …
While accountants are used to viewing data in a multitude of rows, columns and pivot tables, most people struggle with seeing any patterns in rows of numbers. The implementation of visualizations through data analytic dashboards allow for you to view data in a user-friendly environment in easy to understand visuals. In addition, the creation of …
Predictive analytics is the utilization of analytics to forecast what will happen in a business. Predictive analytics is the usage of everything gathered in descriptive and diagnostic analytics along with the continued use of modeling, machine learning and risk assessments to make predictions about future events/trends by scoring data and forecasting. Predictive analytics are generated …
Diagnostic analytics uses analytics to describe why something happened. Diagnostic analytics takes the development of descriptive analytics a step further and is generating a root cause analysis to see: What caused the company’s sales last month, last quarter, last year to increase or decrease? Why were there changes in the company’s largest customer? Why were …
Descriptive analytics is the utilization of analytics to describe what happened. Generally, descriptive analytics entails the gathering of historical data/transactions and using this data to answer questions about the past and provide context to historical activity. Questions like: What were the Company’s sales last month, last quarter, last year? Who were the Company’s largest and …
It’s not news the IRS is auditing fewer returns; staff levels are down. Still that is no excuse to “play the audit lottery” and cheat on your taxes. Despite low audit risk, the IRS is still conducting audits, whether or not you are preparing. What to do when that dreaded fat envelope shows up from …