How will your gift of stock be valued?
It's the average of the high and low prices for the stock on the date of the transfer to us. If the high bid was $80 and the low was $70 on the day you made your gift, your deduction will be $75 per share. IMPORTANT!
Don't sell the stock first!
Even though you give us the proceeds as a gift, the IRS will impose capital gains tax on your sale, wiping out the benefits of this arrangement.
What if your stock has declined in value?
The fair-market deduction rule works against you: if you bought stock for $50,000 and it's now worth $30,000, your charitable deduction will be limited to $30,000. You won't earn a capital loss by making the transfer to us, either. It is better to sell depreciated stock, claim the resulting tax loss as one deduction, then make a deductible cash gift to United Way with the proceeds.
Note that the IRS allows cash gifts to be deducted up to 50 percent of adjusted gross income. Therefore, the deduction for a large gift of appreciated assets could take longer to claim than the deduction for the same gift made in cash. But if the donated assets had a small cost basis, they could still be more tax-efficient to use than cash.
