Tax Losses and Internal Revenue Service

Internal Revenue Service: Its the time of the year when investors dump this years losers from their portfolios to lock in the tax losses for the calendar year, according to Market Watch. Its always interesting when you know the stock market is behaving irrationally, and the tax code is one reason why it might. The Internal Revenue Service, by imposing an arbitrary Dec. 31 deadline each year for recognizing losses, effectively drives the market to behave in the final weeks of the year in ways that are not directly related to the fundamentals of the companies and Brett Arends Columnist If you havent already had enough turkey after the holiday weekend, theres plenty more available right now on Wall Street. This year investors have special reason to cash in the losses because its been an up year for the markets, so they re looking at some taxable gains in the rest of their portfolios. (news.financializer.com). As reported in the news.