Muni-bond appetite on the rise as investors seek tax-free safety: More investors are looking to add municipal bonds in their portfolios as they prefer safer investments in the wake of the Fed's decision not to raise interest rates, according to MarketWatch.

A new temporary highway funding bill recently became law. Buried within this temporary bill (the highway money runs out again October 29, 2015) are several tax law changes that have nothing to do with highway funding. Most of the tax law changes are effective after December 31, 2015 or for the 2016 tax year.

In a victory for CPAs reminiscent of last year’s passage of municipal income tax reform, the Ohio Supreme Court recently ruled unanimously in favor of taxpayers in the case of MacDonald v. Shaker Heights Board of Income Tax Review.

For decades, the IRS used the same application, Form 1023, for all nonprofits seeking Section 501 (c)(3) tax-exempt status. Although, the IRS had a lower application fee ($400 instead of $800) for small nonprofits with annual gross income of less than $10,000, there wasn’t a simpler application process for the small organizations.

“EMV” is shorthand for Europay, MasterCard and Visa, three major players that joined forces to create protocols for global payment card acceptance. The EMV system works with point-of-sale terminal and ATM manufacturers and credit card processors to ensure that new cards embedded with electronic chips work worldwide. It is the only effective and efficient technology now in use that can prevent payment card fraud on a global scale.

The District Court for the Northern District of Ohio denied a couple’s theft loss deduction for the worthless stock they acquired as part of a “pump and dump” scheme.