Dorrance v. United States, No. 13-16548 (9th Cir. 2015)
Annotate this CaseTaxpayers received and then sold stock derived from the demutualization of five mutual life insurance companies from which they had purchased policies. At issue was whether a life insurance policyholder has any basis in a mutual life insurance company’s membership rights. The court held that taxpayers who sold stock obtained through demutualization cannot claim a basis in that stock for tax purposes because they had a zero basis in the mutual rights that were extinguished during the demutualization. The district court skipped a critical step by examining the value of the mutual rights without evidence of whether the taxpayers paid anything to first acquire them. The district court also erred when it estimated basis by using the stock price at the time of demutualization rather than calculating basis at the time the policies were acquired. Consequently, the court concluded that the IRS properly rejected taxpayers' refund claim in this case where they offered nothing to show payment for their stake in the membership rights, as opposed to premium payments for the underlying insurance coverage. Accordingly, the court reversed the district court's denial of the government's motion for summary judgment.
Court Description: Tax. The panel reversed the district court’s denial of the government’s motion for summary judgment in a tax refund action involving the calculation of the cost basis of stock received through demutualization. Taxpayers received and then sold stock derived from the demutualization of five mutual insurance companies from which they had purchased life insurance policies. Taxpayers initially asserted a zero cost basis in the stock and paid tax on the gain, but later claimed a full refund. The district court held that taxpayers had a calculable basis in the stock and were therefore entitled to a partial refund. The panel held that the Internal Revenue Service properly denied the refund claim and that the district court had erred in its cost basis calculation because taxpayers had not met their burden of showing that they had in some way paid for the stock. The panel explained that under the life insurance policies, taxpayers were entitled to certain contractual rights such as a death benefit, the right to surrender the policy for cash value, and annual dividends. After demutualization, taxpayers retained their contractual interests and continued to pay the same premiums. Taxpayers as policyholders also had certain membership rights for which they received nothing upon DORRANCE V. UNITED STATES 3 demutualization. The stock they received was due to the legal requirement that the insurance companies produce a “fair and equitable” allocation of each company’s surplus at the time of demutualization, but evidence showed that this was not based on some premium value that taxpayers had paid in the past. Judge M. Smith dissented. He agreed with the district court’s cost basis calculation, and disagreed with the majority’s view that taxpayers paid nothing for their membership rights.
The court issued a subsequent related opinion or order on December 30, 2015.
Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.