NYT acquires 1995 Trump tax return; he deducted $916 million in business losses

[dspNY]

It is possible that Trump has not paid any federal tax for 20 years after deducting $916 million in losses in 1995

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/02/us/politics/donald-trump-taxes.html?smid=tw-nytimes&smtyp=cur&_r=0

[dspNY]

Time for him to drop out.

This is approaching Bernie Madoff level fraud

[dspNY]

Wow. The returns that were anonymously sent to the New York Times had this address:

725 5th Avenue New York, NY 10022 A.K.A. Trump Tower

Now, it's true you can write any address on an envelope, but is it possible there's a "whistleblower" inside the Trump Campaign? Is it possible this person has more years of tax returns? Something's going here folks!

lol, if it is one of his ex-wives.

Sweet revenge if Marla did it (her name is also on the tax return since they filed jointly)

[dspNY]

#LastTimeTrumpPaidTaxes immediately trending

[dspNY]

If the losses are real, it is legitimate to deduct the loss. End of story. The income tax is about taxing income.

It shows you he's a terrible businessman. A $916 million business loss in that era is staggering. Remember that inflation occurred in the last 20-25 years

[dspNY]

How the f*** do you accrue $915 million in losses???

Simple.  Be in the real estate business during the late 80s/early 90s, when real estate values cratered.  Sell a building or two for a loss to raise cash to cover losses in your casino and airline businesses.  Presto - you have an operating loss in the casino and airline businesses, and a loss on the buildings to carry forward.

By the way, I don't think Trump incurred most of this loss in 1995.  The bulk of it was likely a net operating loss carryforward from prior years.

There were only about 200 billionaires in the world in that era, so to lose that sum of money, even over a decade, is astonishingly awful

[dspNY]

If the losses are real, it is legitimate to deduct the loss. End of story. The income tax is about taxing income.

It shows you he's a terrible businessman. A $916 million business loss in that era is staggering. Remember that inflation occurred in the last 20-25 years

Given what happened to the commercial real estate market in the late 80s and early 90s, a large loss for a real estate developer in that era isn't all that staggering.

$916 million, much of it on casinos, which should be money spinners, is pretty much fraud

[dspNY]

For reference: the greatest one year loss Apple ever recorded was $816 million

[dspNY]

Where's the outrage, red avatars? Pay your "fair share" New York Times.

Pot... Meet Kettle.

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Source: http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffreydorfman/2016/01/31/new-york-times-hypocrisy-on-corporate-taxes-reaches-record-high/#19407c657754

Always attacking the messenger. Did Kellyanne give you that ridiculous piece of spin?

[dspNY]

This is the most astonishingly ignorant thread I've read here, and that's saying a lot.

Let me try to simplify this.

You lose $900m this year. You are in the hole $900 million.

Next year, you make $900m in profit. Where are you? Only back to break even.

Your profit is zero over that time frame. Of course your tax should be zero. (Ignoring carry forward loss limitations for simplicity's sake, but including it would make the lefty argument even more ridiculous.)

Yet we have lots of people here who think in the described scenario, that this business should pay $300m plus in taxes...on a ZERO PROFIT situation. You all are beyond Karl Marx territory if you honestly believe that.

I just can't believe what I'm reading here.

Probably a good post.

90% of people are missing this point.

Try investing $1Bn in the USA and see how comfortable you feel.

Without investment, you dont have a country.

But the point is he failed dramatically at investing it, showing that he is a pretty bad businessman

[dspNY]

This is the most astonishingly ignorant thread I've read here, and that's saying a lot.

Let me try to simplify this.

You lose $900m this year. You are in the hole $900 million.

Next year, you make $900m in profit. Where are you? Only back to break even.

Your profit is zero over that time frame. Of course your tax should be zero. (Ignoring carry forward loss limitations for simplicity's sake, but including it would make the lefty argument even more ridiculous.)
 

Should you be able to deduct gambling losses in the same way? It's the same concept. You're x dollars in the hole. Next year you make x dollars. You're back to even and your tax should be 0.

The only difference is judgment call that property development is in the public interest and should be treated as a special loss, whereas gambling is not. But that's a judgment call by society.

Yet we have lots of people here who think in the described scenario, that this business should pay $300m plus in taxes...on a ZERO PROFIT situation. You all are beyond Karl Marx territory if you honestly believe that.

He's not a business. He's a person. It's his personal tax return.

Which also begs the question...did Trump mix his business losses into his personal tax return to benefit further? Remember, his business returns should be more complicated and separate from Schedules A, B, C and D

[dspNY]

Another reference to how heinous Trump's writeoff was:

In 1995, all NOL writeoffs in the United States totaled $49.331 billion. Trump's $916 million was 1.9% of that. Trump contributed almost 2% of the national non-operating loss write-off in the country that year

https://twitter.com/AlanMCole/status/782932366255796225

[dspNY]

I am not tax savvy by any means, in fact I'm pretty ignorant of that realm. However, this sounds real sleazy to me....

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And then Trump goes on to make a fortune off of other people's loss? That sounds like the sleazy truth to me. So yes, let's praise him for being such a genius.

http://www.cnn.com/2016/10/02/opinions/why-trump-tax-news-is-stunning-mccaffery/index.html

Which again asks the question of whether Trump used his business losses and money from other people as part of this horrendous $916 million write-off. At least if Warren Buffett or the Clintons write off a large sum, you know it is their money

[dspNY]

The NY Daily News also got the same documents

http://money.cnn.com/2016/10/03/media/new-york-daily-news-donald-trump-tax-return/index.html

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Lends a lot of smoke to the theory that Marla or Tiffany Trump sent them to both papers