Earlier this week, the IRS issued Notice 2012-9, “Interim Guidance on Informational Reporting to Employees of the Cost of Their Group Health Insurance Coverage.”

As the IRS notes on its page outlining the provisions of the Affordable Care Act, starting in tax year 2011, the Act required employers to report the cost of coverage provided through an employer-sponsored group health plan. This reporting is for informational purposes only, and intended to show employees the value of their healthcare benefits so they can be more informed consumers. The amount reported does not affect tax liability, and the value of the employer’s contribution to health coverage continues to be excluded from employees’ income, and isn’t taxable. more

After a year of both positive and negative month-to-month changes, the Credit Managers Index (CMI) inched up to 54.4 in December, its highest level since May. (Numbers higher than 50 indicate expansion; numbers below 50 indicate contraction.)

However, the Index remains below the level of a year ago, when it was at 55.8. The Index incorporates ten factors, including sales, new credit applications, bankruptcy filings and accounts placed for collection, and covers both manufacturing and service industries. The CMI is calculated by the National Association of Credit Management (NACM) in Columbia, Md. The index is based on responses from about 900 trade credit managers, about evenly divided between manufacturing and service organizations. more

The allure of some sort of tax holiday on repatriated earnings, which I covered in this blog back in June 2011, remains strong. In October, members of the House of Representatives’ Democratic Blue Dog Coalition, a group of fiscal conservatives, added their support behind H.R. 1834, or the “Freedom to Invest Act of 2011,” as this article from the Win America Campaign describes. The legislation would, among other things, extend the election allowed to a U.S. corporation to deduct dividends received from a controlled foreign corporation.

In a letter to the members of the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction – the now defunct “Super Committee” – the Blue Dogs also stated, “As you consider tax reform, we urge you to include a temporary change to the tax code that allows businesses to repatriate money trapped overseas as part of reform or as a bridge to comprehensive reform.” The letter went on to say that “experts agree that temporarily lowering tax barriers will bring earnings back home, and therefore strengthen our economy.” more

Earlier this month, a joint hearing of the Senate Committee on Finance and the House Committee on Ways and Means focused on the tax treatment of financial products. The goals: to consider how Congress should respond to the potentially inconsistent tax treatment of economically similar financial products, and to determine how well the tax code has responded to the evolving financial products market, according to the Hearing Advisory.

Among those testifying was Thomas Barthold, chief of staff of the Joint Committee on Taxation. Barthold provided some context to the discussion, describing the astronomical growth in some derivative products. For instance, over the past twelve years, the notional amount outstanding of swaps (not including credit derivatives) jumped tenfold, from $14.3 trillion in 1998 to $149 trillion in 2010. Barthold also discussed several issues that arise when determining how to tax financial products. One issue: some instruments have characteristics of both debt and equity, which generally are taxed differently. more

Just what issues and challenges are likely to impact corporate treasurers in 2012? The folks at tech giant Sungard have identified the top treasury trends for the coming year. Among them:

1. An increased focus on assessing risk holistically. Several drivers are behind this trend, says Paul Bramwell, Sungard’s senior vice president of treasury solutions. One is simply an increased awareness of the risks – FX, interest rate, credit, among others – to which their organizations are vulnerable. Of course, the global financial crisis highlighted the need to focus on risk over the past few years. In addition, ongoing questions about the viability of the euro, as well as fluctuations in foreign exchange rates, are adding to the uncertain environment. Treasurers want to know where their cash will be today, tomorrow and in the future, in order to make sure that they’ve planned adequately for any upcoming debt repayments or business flows they need to accommodate, Bramwell says. more