New blog post: Traders: Good and Troubling News in Poppe Ruling
Excerpts on prop trading: (Is anyone on Elite having problems with the IRS over these issues?)
The Poppe court construed Poppe’s proprietary trading firm arrangement to be a disguised retail customer account. This ruling should be a huge concern for the proprietary trading firm industry, especially since regulators warned clearing firms about disguised customer accounts in the past. By agreement, prop traders do not trade their own capital in a retail customer account. They trade a firm sub-account with firm capital and far higher inter-firm leverage than is available with a retail customer account.
Proprietary trading account or disguised customer account?
In 2007 (the IRS exam year), Poppe lost $1 million trading with a proprietary trading firm that cleared through Goldman Sachs Execution & Clearing (GSEC). This is the tax loss at the center of this case.
On his original tax return filing, Poppe reported this loss (assumed) on Schedule E page 2, as an ordinary loss flowing through to him as a partner in a partnership. If the proprietary trading firm qualified for TTS and filed a timely Section 475 election on the firm level, then trading losses allocated to partners would have ordinary loss treatment.
Poppe attached a partner Schedule K-1 to his tax return even though it is not required. But during the exam, the IRS was unable to find Poppe’s K-1 in the partnership tax return filings where it is required to be attached. This begs the question: Did Poppe fabricate his own Schedule K-1? That would be illegal. Or did the firm present Poppe with a Schedule K-1 only to retract it in their partnership tax filing later on? (IRS computers match K-1s reported on partner’s individual tax returns with partnership tax filings looking for incorrect reporting.)
Prop trading firm arrangements, agreements, tax treatment and regulatory issues are murky. Perhaps Poppe never formally signed the prop trading firm’s LLC Operating Agreement. The case states Poppe couldn’t satisfy the IRS that he was a partner in the firm. If not an LLC member, perhaps he was an independent contractor, which is the second business model for proprietary trading firms.
Poppe claimed he was a Class B member of the firm. Generally, the main owners (Class A members) are allocated firm-wide trading losses on their K-1s since they own the firm’s capital in their capital accounts, which provide tax basis for deducting trading losses. Generally, Class B members don’t have capital accounts so they aren’t allocated losses since they wouldn’t have tax basis to deduct losses, which would then be suspended to subsequent years when they might have capital.
Instead of paying into firm capital, Class B members pay “deposits” to the firm. This is where the confusion mainly lies. The firm applies these deposits to cover the prop trader’s trading losses incurred in a firm sub-account. Prop traders are entitled to deduct lost deposits as business bad debts, which are ordinary business losses. Perhaps Poppe should have considered lost deposit bad debt tax treatment instead of using an incorrect K-1 and later relying on an alleged Section 475 election as a retail individual trader.
I’ve been covering the proprietary trading industry since the late 1990s. Around 2000, some people questioned whether proprietary trading firm arrangements were really “disguised” retail customer accounts. Reg T margin rules allow 4:1 margin on pattern day trader (PDT) customer accounts requiring a $25,000 minimum account size. Otherwise, retail investors are limited to 2:1 margin on securities. The big attraction of proprietary trading firms is they offer proprietary traders (LLC members or independent contractors) far greater leverage (greater than 10:1 in some cases) on their deposits made with the firm. Some proprietary trading firms have minimum deposit amounts as low as $2,000.
If the firm’s profit sharing arrangement is more than 80% sharing to the prop trader, FINRA’s Regulatory Notice 10-18 issued to clearing firms stated it’s one of several signs it may be a disguised retail customer account. Read my June 2010 blog post FINRA’s notice to prop traders. Poppe had 90% profit sharing and perhaps that led the IRS to conclude it was a disguised retail customer account. GSEC is a popular clearing firm for proprietary trading firms and I don’t believe it services individual retail customers. Goldman Sachs brokerage firm has high standards for opening individual retail customer accounts.
The Poppe opinion states: “The parties stipulated that all transactions and capital in the GSEC account belonged to petitioner (Poppe).” Perhaps the parties preferred this tact so they could ague the case over Poppe’s alleged Section 475 election as a retail trader. In my view, the word “stipulate” means the parties agreed on facts as a pre-condition to negotiating a settlement. But it’s not necessarily the true facts.
Should prop traders file Section 475 elections as a backup position in case the IRS later considers them a disguised retail customer account? I imagine plenty proprietary trading firms and prop traders are in tax controversy (exams, appeals or tax court) now and I suggest they consider contacting our CPA firm for help soon.
Excerpts on prop trading: (Is anyone on Elite having problems with the IRS over these issues?)
The Poppe court construed Poppe’s proprietary trading firm arrangement to be a disguised retail customer account. This ruling should be a huge concern for the proprietary trading firm industry, especially since regulators warned clearing firms about disguised customer accounts in the past. By agreement, prop traders do not trade their own capital in a retail customer account. They trade a firm sub-account with firm capital and far higher inter-firm leverage than is available with a retail customer account.
Proprietary trading account or disguised customer account?
In 2007 (the IRS exam year), Poppe lost $1 million trading with a proprietary trading firm that cleared through Goldman Sachs Execution & Clearing (GSEC). This is the tax loss at the center of this case.
On his original tax return filing, Poppe reported this loss (assumed) on Schedule E page 2, as an ordinary loss flowing through to him as a partner in a partnership. If the proprietary trading firm qualified for TTS and filed a timely Section 475 election on the firm level, then trading losses allocated to partners would have ordinary loss treatment.
Poppe attached a partner Schedule K-1 to his tax return even though it is not required. But during the exam, the IRS was unable to find Poppe’s K-1 in the partnership tax return filings where it is required to be attached. This begs the question: Did Poppe fabricate his own Schedule K-1? That would be illegal. Or did the firm present Poppe with a Schedule K-1 only to retract it in their partnership tax filing later on? (IRS computers match K-1s reported on partner’s individual tax returns with partnership tax filings looking for incorrect reporting.)
Prop trading firm arrangements, agreements, tax treatment and regulatory issues are murky. Perhaps Poppe never formally signed the prop trading firm’s LLC Operating Agreement. The case states Poppe couldn’t satisfy the IRS that he was a partner in the firm. If not an LLC member, perhaps he was an independent contractor, which is the second business model for proprietary trading firms.
Poppe claimed he was a Class B member of the firm. Generally, the main owners (Class A members) are allocated firm-wide trading losses on their K-1s since they own the firm’s capital in their capital accounts, which provide tax basis for deducting trading losses. Generally, Class B members don’t have capital accounts so they aren’t allocated losses since they wouldn’t have tax basis to deduct losses, which would then be suspended to subsequent years when they might have capital.
Instead of paying into firm capital, Class B members pay “deposits” to the firm. This is where the confusion mainly lies. The firm applies these deposits to cover the prop trader’s trading losses incurred in a firm sub-account. Prop traders are entitled to deduct lost deposits as business bad debts, which are ordinary business losses. Perhaps Poppe should have considered lost deposit bad debt tax treatment instead of using an incorrect K-1 and later relying on an alleged Section 475 election as a retail individual trader.
I’ve been covering the proprietary trading industry since the late 1990s. Around 2000, some people questioned whether proprietary trading firm arrangements were really “disguised” retail customer accounts. Reg T margin rules allow 4:1 margin on pattern day trader (PDT) customer accounts requiring a $25,000 minimum account size. Otherwise, retail investors are limited to 2:1 margin on securities. The big attraction of proprietary trading firms is they offer proprietary traders (LLC members or independent contractors) far greater leverage (greater than 10:1 in some cases) on their deposits made with the firm. Some proprietary trading firms have minimum deposit amounts as low as $2,000.
If the firm’s profit sharing arrangement is more than 80% sharing to the prop trader, FINRA’s Regulatory Notice 10-18 issued to clearing firms stated it’s one of several signs it may be a disguised retail customer account. Read my June 2010 blog post FINRA’s notice to prop traders. Poppe had 90% profit sharing and perhaps that led the IRS to conclude it was a disguised retail customer account. GSEC is a popular clearing firm for proprietary trading firms and I don’t believe it services individual retail customers. Goldman Sachs brokerage firm has high standards for opening individual retail customer accounts.
The Poppe opinion states: “The parties stipulated that all transactions and capital in the GSEC account belonged to petitioner (Poppe).” Perhaps the parties preferred this tact so they could ague the case over Poppe’s alleged Section 475 election as a retail trader. In my view, the word “stipulate” means the parties agreed on facts as a pre-condition to negotiating a settlement. But it’s not necessarily the true facts.
Should prop traders file Section 475 elections as a backup position in case the IRS later considers them a disguised retail customer account? I imagine plenty proprietary trading firms and prop traders are in tax controversy (exams, appeals or tax court) now and I suggest they consider contacting our CPA firm for help soon.
