IRS Obsoletes Several Guidance Items

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has released Notice 2026-58, eliminating extraneous and unnecessary items by identifying and obsoleting 71 Revenue Rulings, Revenue Procedures, Notices and Announcements that were previously published. The Notice is part of an ongoing exercise pursuant to Executive Order 14192, Unleashing Prosperity Through Deregulation, issued by the President last year.

The following guidance items are of note in the release.

• Notice 96-8, Cash Balance Pension Plans, provides guidance concerning the requirements of sections 411(a) and 417(e) with respect to the determination of the amount of a single sum distribution from a cash balance plan. According to the IRS, this guidance was obsoleted by section 701(b) of the Pension Protection Act of 2006, which enacted Internal Revenue Code Sections (IRC Secs.) 411(a)(13) and (b)(5).

• Rev. Rul. 2003-6, Employee Stock Ownership Plans; Delayed Effective Date; Abuse, identifies as a listed transaction all transactions attempting to avoid the effective date of IRC Sec. 409(p) by using employee stock ownership plans formed on or before March 14, 2001. It is obsolete as it relates to past years and not applicable to current or future years.