Cancellation of distributorship agreement. This ruling holds that the cancellation of an agreement to distribute a manufacturer’s products may be a sale or exchange of property. The gain may be capital gain or treated as capital gain and may be subject to recapture.

Proposed regulations provide rules under section 152(e) of the Code relating to a claim that a child is a dependent by parents who are divorced, legally separated under a decree of separate maintenance, separated under a written separation agreement, or who live apart at all times during the last 6 months of the calendar year.

Deductibility of lodging expenses. This notice announces that the Service and the Department of the Treasury intend to amend regulations section 1.262-1(b)(5) to provide that the costs of a taxpayer’s lodging not incurred while traveling away from home may qualify as deductible expenses under section 162 of the Code and thus would not be nondeductible personal expenses. The notice also provides interim guidance on the criteria that apply to determine whether these costs are deductible expenses pending the issuance of the amended regulations.

Final regulations under section 401 of the Code provide rules permitting in-service distributions to be made to a participant from a pension plan upon the participant’s attainment of normal retirement age. A plan’s normal retirement age must be an age that is not earlier than the earliest age that is reasonably representative of the typical retirement age for the industry in which the covered workforce is employed. A transition rule under section 411(d)(6) permitting the elimination of certain in-service distribution rights is provided. These regulations affect sponsors of, and participants in, tax-qualified plans.

Proposed regulations under section 430 of the Code provide generally applicable mortality tables to be used in determining present value or making any computation for purposes of applying the minimum funding requirements for single employer qualified defined benefit pension plans pursuant to changes made by the Pension Protection Act of 2006 (Pub. L. No. 109-280). The regulations also provide guidance regarding an employer’s request to use its own plan-specific mortality tables.

This document contains corrections to final regulations (T.D. 9319, 2007-18 I.R.B. 1041) regarding the limitations of section 415 of the Code, including updates to the regulations for numerous statutory changes, since comprehensive final regulations were last published under section 415.