I hold the Gold ETF (GLD) and have received a 1099B for this fund.
There are several small amounts listed on the Form called Principal
Payments.
Looking around at various tax guidance reports prepared by various
financial institutions I'm reading the following with reference to
these items:
"Widely Held Fixed Investment Trusts
(�WHFIT�)
These special reporting requirements for these securities will
create signifi cant diff erences between the amounts reported on tax
forms compared to what appeared in your monthly statements.
The primary reasons for that are as follows: (a) the income must be
reported in the gross amount, including any fees or expenses that
were deducted by the Trustee prior the distribution, and (b) the
income must be reported be based on the tax year and date it was
received by the Trustee (the �record date�) rather than when it
was paid to you (the �payment date�). These securities include
royalty trusts, commodity trusts, mortgage pools, HOLDRS trusts,
many unit investment trusts (UITs) and some exchange traded
funds (ETFs)."
and
"Commodity trusts � a type of �WHFIT�
These trusts frequently do not make any cash distributions to
investors, but simply hold gold or silver. However, if the trustee
sells part of that commodity to pay expenses, that results in Form
1099-B reporting to you to account for the sale and an off setting
expense amount that you will find in the �Federal Nonreportable�
section of your statement. Examples include iShares COMEX Gold
(IAU), iShares Silver (SLV) and SPDR Gold ETF (GLD)."
(I think the above is from the Wells Fargo tax guide, but all the
guides are using pretty much the same boilerplate.)
Anyway, here's the question(s):
It sounds to me like I need to list each of these small Principal
Payments on Schedule D, with no associated basis. Correct?
Since the "off setting expenses" mentioned above get reported in a
"Federal Nonreportable" section of the 1099B it sounds like they don't
go anywhere in the tax return. Correct?
TIA.
Tom Young
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After doing that for a year, you may decide that these trusts should
be owned in retirement accounts where all of that rigmarole can be
avoided.
Technically the sales are used to pay for investment expenses, which
go on Schedule A, miscellaneous deductions. Most people don't get a
tax benefit from those. They are "nonreportable" because the IRS
doesn't require that the broker report them to the IRS; not that they
don't have a tax implication.
Thanks for the reply. Moving this investment to my ROTH sounds like a
very practical suggestion.
Tom Young
Tom Young