That’s Judge Emin (“Eminent”) Toro’s scorecard at close of play in Continental Grand Limited Partnership, Century Subsidiary Corporation, Tax Matters Partner, 166 T. C. 3, filed 3/2/26.

It’s the usual daisy chain among offshore indifferents and an onshore heavy. US parent of an offshore holding company and the latter’s offshore sub set up a boxchecked onshore LLC, wherein both onshore overparent and offshore sub are partners. Offshore sub elects per Reg Section 301.7701-3(c) to be disregarded from offshore holding company. Then offshore holding company issues promissory note, guaranteed by onshore overparent, for $610 million to offshore sub, which in turn assigns note to onshore LLC. Election was retroactively made effective to a time before offshore sub contributed the note to the onshore LLC, which is OK here. Then offshore holding company pays it off seven (count ’em, seven) years later for $1 billion-with-a-b, including principal and accrued interest. Then offshore sub bails from partnership, taking $1 billion-with-a-b along.

Offshore sub claims substantial basis in note. IRS says zero basis in offshore holding company in its own note, zero basis in note in onshore overparent guarantor, and zero basis in note for partnership. Hence onshore overparent had no tax benefit on dissolution of partnership.

See my blogpost “A Sour Note,” 9/3/14 for how this attempted guarantee basis-builder fails.

Yes, in this case the note was valid, legal and binding when and where issued. And yes, it was worth the face value then and there. 

Per Treas. Reg. 301.7701-3(g)(1)(iii), as no exceptions apply here, when offshore sub elected disregarded, it’s deemed to have transferred all of its assets and liabilities to offshore holding company. Hence when offshore holding company issued the note ostensibly to offshore sub, it issued the note to itself, and then itself contributed to note to the partnership. Arguments that this cuts off offshore law as to separation of parent and sub has nothing to do with how the USA taxes the deal. Sub and offshore holding company may be separate under local law, and taxed offshore however local law provides.

A note is a chose in action, the right to press a legal claim to receive money. It may be property (Judge Toro says he isn’t going metaphysical on whether a note is “property”, Opinion, at p. 10), but in the hands of its maker a note has no basis; it cost nothing. And by electing disregarded status, offshore sub became offshore holding company, hence offshore holding company was holding its own note payable to itself. The issue is not that the note was contributed to the partnership; Section 722 requires examination of the value of the note in offshore holding company’s hands. All the note does is evidence offshore holding company’s obligation to pay itself. 

The negative currency fluctuations that hurt the offshore sub when it took the payout is nothing to the point. Offshore sub elected a year after it got and contributed the note to go disregarded back to pre-note days.  National Alfalfa says you can choose your system, but once chosen, you’re stuck.

Petition asserts two cases, but they’re C Corp cases, and here we have Sub K issues. Offshore holding company had zero basis in its own note, and its electing offshore sub is disregarded. Section 723 says contribution by partner to partnership gives partnership partner’s basis in the contribution, and here it’s zero.

Judge Christian N. (“Speedy”) Weiler once again has the granite grabbing, discounted cash flow,  Dixieland Boondockery dodge on the menu in Harman Road Property, LLC, Capital Conservation Partners II, LLC, Tax Matters Partner, et al., T. C. Memo. 2026-23, filed 3/2/26. IRS, magnanimously or otherwise, folds its claim for the penalties asserted under section 6662A resulting from the identification of syndicated conservation easement transactions pursuant to I.R.S. Notice 2017-10, 2017-4 I.R.B. 544, Opinion, at p. 2, footnote 4.

It’s the usual market-rate purchase of granite-bearing land followed by selling fractional LLC interests at a 300% – 400% markup to writeoff-seeking highrollers, and claiming a conservation easement of telephone numbers featuring an appraisal by Fifth Amendment specialist CW (name omitted) and input from a bunch uomini qualificati (hi, Judge Holmes). like Qualified Persons (as defined by the SEC, the stock market guys, not the GA athletes) and Six Sigma Competent Person types.

IRS has a bunch locals from the county and a couple of taxpayer-funded qualificati of their own, including but without in any way limiting the generality of the foregoing (as my expensive former colleagues would say) their in-house appraiser Everybody Loves Raymond.

Once again its comps-vs-cash. Nobody pays the worth of the whole operation upfront, and nobody buys anything in one place when they can get it cheaper somewhere else. No need to drill and explore the comps, as everybody knows they’re in the Piedmont Fall Line where the granite is found. Comps beat cash again.

Microscopic deductions allowed. 40% gross overvaluation chops rain down.

11 Cir, ignoring 2 Cir, 3 Cir, and 6 Cir, stood by Tax Court in denying equitable tolling while reaffirming Pugsley in Allen v. Com’r, No. 22-12537, 12/21/22. As I’ve said often before now, I don’t follow appellate courts; the trade press and blogosphere do that with more resources than a mancaver like me can ever muster. I didn’t blog Allen when then-Ch J Maurice B. (“Mighty Mo”) Foley tossed the petition with the usual one-page, day-late-dollar-short Order; there were dozens such then and since.

But to buttress Pugsley, apparently after an irreverent blogger questioned Tax Court’s reliance on a case decided years before Boechler, P. C., and wherein the Section 6213(a) jurisdictional barrier received less than a clause in a sentence as 11 Cir’s definitive word on jurisdiction-vs-claim-processing, Ch J Patrick J. (“Scholar Pat”) Urda has 11 Cir’s post-Boechler, P.C., statement upon which to rely. 11 Cir even cites Pugsley approvingly.

For the whole story, see Amanda Lopez Docket No. 16760-25S, filed 3/2/26. Amanda says she really got the IRS run-around.

 “In particular, petitioner highlighted having been in communication with the IRS office in Austin, Texas, since at least July of 2025, responding to earlier notices from the agency and even submitting an amended return. Strongly emphasized were the unreasonable amounts of time taken by the IRS to address or to even acknowledge her submissions and the failure by contact persons to return messages left by phone. Attached to the motion were copies of letters sent by petitioner to the IRS, supporting her statements. Petitioner also reiterated her position regarding the inaccuracy of the proposed amounts.” Order, at p. 2.

Sorry, Amanda, you’re in FL, hence Golsenized to 11 Cir, so being six (count ’em, six) days late means a trip to USDC or USCFC (if you can afford to pay the tax and your lawyer).

So the score in CCA’s March Madness stands at three to one, three for Boechler, P. C. and one for Hallmark Rsch. Collective and its kin. 

And since the Supremes denied cert in Culp (3 Cir), there’ll be more.

A couple days ago (hi, Judge Holmes), namely, 2/27/26, I noted that the page count of Tax Court Orders on DAWSON’s Creek was out of order (see my blogpost “Draining the Swamp – Part Deux.” 2/27/26). I noted that I had informed the Genius Baristas.

Now comes their reply.

“Thank you for contacting DAWSON Support. The Court’s DAWSON tech team is aware of this issue and hopes to have it resolved soon.”

It’s five years and more since the rollout of DAWSON’s Creek. Comment is superfluous.