IRS just killed a rich guy tax trick

just added the borders

July 10, 2026

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Today’s Ledger:

  • The IRS found the rich guy trust trick.

  • KPMG’s AI survey stepped on a rake.

  • AI is now the cleanest excuse for layoffs.

WTF of the Day🤯

The IRS Just Nuked A Rich Guy Trust Trick

Some tax plans look smart until the IRS gives them a name. This one worked like this. A client put an asset that had gone way up in value into a charitable trust. The trust sold it. Then the cash went into an annuity. After that, the client only taxed part of the payment. Nice little magic trick. Big gain goes in. Smaller tax bill comes out.

Now the IRS says this is a listed transaction. That means the fun part is over. Clients may have to disclose it. Advisors may have to file too. Miss it and the penalties can get ugly. The wild part is the CPA may not have built the thing. Some lawyer, wealth advisor, insurance person, or tax promoter may have sold it years ago. But the CPA is the one staring at the return now. So firms should search for clients with big asset sales, charitable trusts, and annuity paperwork before the IRS shows up and makes the search a lot less fun.

What’s poppin in accounting🍿

KPMG Found The AI Problem It Helped Create

KPMG put out a new AI survey, and the funny part is not the headline. It is the gap between what leaders say and what companies are doing. Firms are still betting hard on AI. Leaders plan to spend an average of $202 million over the next year. But only 26% say they can see the real cost of running AI in real time. So companies are pushing AI deeper into the business while many of them still do not know what the bill really looks like.

Then comes the best part. KPMG says some companies are trying to boost AI use with incentives, but warns that chasing usage can lead to dumb behavior. That is rich, because KPMG has had its own AI usage targets. One employee said people were typing random prompts just to hit the daily quota. That is the whole problem in one sentence. If you reward people for using AI, they will use AI. That does not mean it saved time, made money, or did anything useful. It just means someone got another dashboard to look green.

Weekly Trend Chart 📊

AI Is Now The Layoff Scapegoat

Companies are blaming AI for layoffs at a wild pace. In May, U.S. employers announced 97,006 job cuts. That was the worst May since 2020. And almost 40% of those cuts were tied to AI. That made AI the top reason for layoffs for the third month in a row.

AI probably did not replace all those people. Some companies are using it as a cleaner way to say the same old thing, we are cutting costs, moving slower, and trying to make Wall Street happy. Still, the fear is not fake. AI has already been linked to more job cuts this year than all of last year, and even Anthropic’s CEO is warning that long-term job loss is a real possibility. RIP to all of us

Meme of the Day😂

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