Recent Developments Impacting Donor Advised Funds
Donor Advised Funds (“DAFs”) have become one of the most popular charitable giving vehicles among donors in the past several decades. Last month Senators Angus King Jr. (I-ME) and Chuck Grassley (R-IA) introduced the Accelerating Charitable Efforts (“ACE”) Act, which would enact radical changes to the U.S. tax treatment of DAFs as further discussed below. Further, two significant cases involving DAFs were recently decided. While the donor plaintiffs in both cases may not have been happy with the results, the holdings in the cases strengthen the current U.S. tax treatment of DAFs based on the fact that a donor to a DAF truly only has “advisory” privileges with respect to the DAF. Read on to learn more about both of these recent developments.