In this surmised summary judgment as to damages, a New York trial court awarded damages to the plaintiff in a breach of contract suit. The determination of damages was made without a trial but “on paper.” Additionally, the court used a subsequent sale of the stock to determine the damages and opine that the company was “worthless.” Read more >>

In this exciting new edition of Understanding Business Valuation, Gary Trugman takes his characteristic talent for simplifying the technical and complex to even greater heights. In his easy-to-read and -understand style, he covers all the bases with valuation approaches, methods, and techniques. Trugman identifies critical points in his callout notes throughout the publication. Read more >>

Well a firestorm hit the legal world of special purpose acquisition corporations (SPACs) when the Delaware Court of Chancery (Lori W. Will, VC) denied motions to dismiss various allegations of some of the public stockholders of Churchill Capital Corp. Read more >>

Two new cases exemplify the need to know the law in the jurisdiction of your case in a marital dissolution (divorce). Read more >>

The BVR legal team often receives inquiries about our method and “rules” behind our case law research and digesting process, so we're sharing this important background information with you. Read more >>

The year 2021 was a year of change not only for the broader world, but also for the legal landscape; the U.S. ushered in a new administration with promises to increase taxes in a broad spectrum of areas, including reviving the estate tax levels to years gone by. This and the increase in litigation activity, perhaps also rebounding from the pandemic, have created an increase in the demand for business valuations and litigation services. Read more >>

The year 2021 was defined by unexpected economic events; from the GameStop Rebellion to changes in how goodwill cases are handled in Florida, 2021 certainly was an interesting time to be in the valuation profession. Read more >>

The Chief Counsel office (IRS) recently released a memorandum, which comes to two primary conclusions. First, under the fair market value standard, the hypothetical willing buyer and willing seller of a company would consider a pending merger when valuing stock for gift tax purposes. Second, the retained interest is not a qualified annuity interest under § 2702 of the Internal Revenue Code (Code) because the donor used an outdated appraisal that did not take into account all the facts and circumstances of a pending merger. Read more >>

The bestselling Business Valuation and Bankruptcy: Case Law Compendium is out now and is in its third edition. This must-have resource is replete with hard-won insights into the often challenging intersection of law and valuation. It summarizes case law and provides insightful analysis on a range of bankruptcy topics. Read more >>

It appears that the courts are rejecting Daubert standard and FRE 702 challenges more frequently. Take a deep dive into potential reasons for this with our legal editor, Jim Alerding. Read more >>

Is anything “company-specific” per se? Company-specific risk is not an ideal name for this risk. All firms face company-specific risks, many of which are somewhat similar across industries and companies. For example, how many firms have you valued that had to deal with the risk of customer concentration? Read more >>

Lately, there has been chatter about the demand for experienced business valuation forensic litigation specialists exceeding the supply of such people. Read more >>

Estate planning can be a risky business. Some of those risks were on full display in a recent tax case, Nelson v. Comm'r. Read more >>

Recently, a district court in Hawaii has ruled in favor of the trustees and sponsors in a case that is getting a lot of attention, Walsh v. Bowers, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 177184. The Department of Labor sued the defendants, which included two individual owners. read on to dive a little deeper into the details of this fascinating case! Read more >>

The 2021 Discount for Lack of Marketability Study provides objective rate of return measures to implement the Johnson/Park empirical method for determining a discount for lack of marketability (DLOM) for the valuation of interests in privately held corporations and partnerships. This report instantly provides you with the most current DLOM rate of return information including a thorough explanation and example on how to apply these data. Read more >>

Recently a court in Arizona rejected the use of a calculation report, but an appellate court ruled it was wrong to do so and sent the case back to the lower court. The reasoning for this decision strikes at a broader question: is calculated value admissible in court? Read more >>

The courts in the past few years have been sprinkled with cases dealing with whether a discount for lack of control (DLOC) or marketability (DLOM) should be applied in the case of a shareholder buyout. Read more >>

Valuing intangible business assets can be overwhelming at times. Between the different approaches and the myriad factors that go into each, it’s easy to miss a step. BVR’s recently released third edition of Benchmarking Identifiable Intangibles and Their Useful Lives in Business Combinations seeks to provide context to this dizzying array of factors with a look at the different approaches for valuing intangible assets—as well as empirical data from actual valuations. Read more >>

The Department of Labor (DOL) has a long history of challenging transactions involving company owners selling some or all of their interests to an ESOP. The most common challenge is to the value the trustees approved for executing the sale of company stock held by owners to the ESOP. Read more >>

Hi, I am Jim Alerding, CPA/ABV. Many of you know me from my presentations and articles over the years. I have over 40 years of experience in business valuation and litigation services. I started in 1980 in the BV and testimony arenas. Since my first case was a valuation for a divorce case in which I then testified, I started in BV and Litigation Support at the same time. Read more >>