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Outstanding Conference Speaker: Dana Basney, CPA, a shareholder in Mayer Hoffman McCann P.C., and a director of CBIZ. Basney has been a speaker at the Fraud in Audit, Accounting and Tax Conference for more than five years.

Outstanding Conference Volunteer: Dennis Brach, CPA. Brach is a tax partner with the San Jose office of Burr, Pilger & Mayer, LLP and has been chair of the International Tax and Business Conference for three years. He also has served on the Conference's planning committee an additional four years, and guided the committee through topic selection and speaker identification.

Electing Longer NOL Carryback Period

The 2009 American Recover) and Reinvestment Act, signed into law Feb. 17, allows an eligible small business (ESB) to elect to carryback an "applicable 2008 net operating loss" (NOL) for a period of three, four or five years.

An ESB is a corporation or partnership meeting IRC Sec. 448(c)'s gross receipts test for the tax year of the NOL or a sole proprietorship, which would meet this test if it were a corporation--but substituting $15 million for $5 million each place it appears in Sec. 448(c).

An applicable 2008 NOL is an NOL for any tax year ending in 2008 or, if the taxpayer elects, an NOL for any tax year beginning in 2008.

Rev. Proc. 2009-26 (IRB 2009-19, May 11, 2009) provides that an ESB may elect a three-, four- or five-year carryback period by filing Form 1045. Form 1139 or an amended return.

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Note: Although Forms 1045 and 1139 ordinarily are due within 12 months after the tax year of the NOL, Sec. 172(b)(1)(H)(iii) requires that the taxpayer elect a three-, four- or five-year carryback by the due date, unlading extensions, of the return for the tax year of the NOL. Thus, a taxpayer seeking to make a timely Sec. 172(b)(1)(H) election (which is irrevocable and can be made only for one tax year) using Form 1045, Form 1139 or an amended return must file that form in advance of its ordinary due date.

Rev. Proc. 2009-26 also prescribes how a taxpayer elects a three-, four- or five-year carryback if the taxpayer previously filed an election to forgo the NOL carryback period for an applicable 2008 NOL, or if the taxpayer is an owner of an ESB that is a partnership, an S corporation or a sole proprietorship.

Rev. Proc. 2009-26 supersedes Rev. Proc 2009-19, which contained more restrictive requirements for electing these longer carryback periods.

Stuart R. Josephs, CPA, Tax Assistance Practice...