Top 10 Tax Headlines from All Regions As part of California's annual budget ordeal, rather than enacting new taxes, the legislature enacted (and the Governor signed) various income shifting and tax acceleration provisions. On December 23, 2008, President Bush signed the Worker, Retiree,and Employer Recovery Act of 2008 (H.R. 7327) (the "WRERAct"), which provides that owners and beneficiaries ofIRAs and other defined contribution plans who are required to takerequired minimum distributions ("RMDs") from their plans in tax year 2009, will generally be able to leave their money in their plans (hopefully to grow) without suffering anypenalty for failure to withdraw. The normal rules still apply for 2008. As we all know, Michael Jackson died this past summer. Although the stories of his unusual lifestyle and abuses have flooded the media, it appears that his estate plan was rather conventional. Like many other developed countries, from time to time the Brazilian government refines and adjusts the legal definition of tax haven jurisdiction ("paraíso fiscal"), initially established by Law No. 9.430, of December 27, 1996, which introduced the transfer pricing regulations in Brazil. Summer has given way to fall, and Congress has returned from its August recess. In addition to facing other substantial initiatives, it has less than three months to address federal estate tax law. The Finance Act 2009 introduced new rules regarding the taxation of foreign profits with the aim of maintaining the UK's competitive position in the global economy. In this article we consider the impact of these changes for investment trust companies and authorised investment funds. The British Columbia and Ontario governments have each released a general description of transition rules for the upcoming replacement of the provincial sales tax in those provinces (“PST”) with a sales tax (the “HST”) harmonized with the federal GST. Failing to comply with various federal group health plan mandates, including COBRA and HIPAA portability, just got riskier and costlier for employers. Canadian income trusts flourished in the earlier part of this decade and provided significant tax benefits to their investors, particularly to investors exempt from Canadian income tax and investors not resident in Canada. As many of you know, the federal estate tax exemption (or credit equivalent) increased on January 1, 2009 from $2 million per person to $3.5 million. | 
