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Strategies & Market Trends : From the Trading Desk -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: jlib who wrote (4370)	3/23/1999 3:49:00 AM
From: Barronio	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 4969

Jimmy, thanks for the link, I was familiar with those issues but I hadn't seen Steve's message on the topic. Unfortunately, I believe Steve is wrong in one respect, when he says "there are no valid or legal reasons for continuing to box positions" and "The 'short against the box' advantage was disallowed by the IRS last year." The IRS did not completely eliminate the 'short against the box' advantage, there is one loophole. Specifically, if you close the short position before the end of January and keep the position unboxed for 60 days, then the short sale is treated as a normal short sale for tax purposes and if the long position had attained long term capital gains status it retains that status. It's not my intention to use a box to circumvent the rules; at no time will I hold the short position alone. My intent is to make some money on the short-term dips of a stock I have held and will continue to hold long term.