IRS "Whistleblower" David A. Nielsen to Appear on 60 Minutes

[Calm]

1 hour ago, Diamondhands69 said:

Page 23 

Thank you.  Quote it please for those not interested in finding it themselves.

Why do you say the whistleblower was the originating incident when he was only referencing Mormonleaks’ work?  Just curious.

Btw, Exhibit P (page 63) never did make sense to me because he drew two circles, one around one list and another around the list of companies identified by Mormonleaks, but there was no correspondence between them…neither the abbreviations nor individual amounts of money came close to corresponding to each other.  Are you (Diamondhands) able to explain it to me?

Edited May 17, 2023 by Calm

[bluebell]

1 hour ago, Diamondhands69 said:

The form is clear. Greg areas pop up when you are lying.

See the form and instructions here:

https://www.sec.gov/pdf/form13f.pdf

Not necessarily. 

Gray areas are often those times where someone with some expertise says "this is how I am interpreting this and it appears to be allowed" and then someone with more authority interprets the same thing in a different way and has the power to declare that the previous "expert" was incorrect.

 

[helix]

1 hour ago, Teancum said:

Ok. I find their site and data fairly reliable

For B. What's the citation for BYU subsidies. This shouldn't be hard to cite.

For C, where did they get the 11,000 employees from, where's the citation for that?  What's the total amount, did they just multiply? The chart above just gives a big fat "C" with no total. 

For D, where did they get $1.1 and $1.2 billion from? Citation? The leaker in 2019 posted a slide giving a $1 billion figure. Does this group have new leaked information that it's now larger?

For E, where did they get 245 million sq ft of temples and chapels? Why did they take a $6 national average and just cut it in half to $3? Any citation or reason why?  Where did the $6 come from?

For G, where did they guess that a ward budget is $6,500? Any justification for just saying a stake gets twice that amount?

For H, where did they get that a seminary teacher only makes $46K a year? Is average salary at glassdoor.com an overall average salary or did glassdoor have insight into seminary totals? Did they factor in costs of seminary buildings anywhere? I don't see it in their estimations.

For I, where in the world are they getting that 4% of of the surplus from D goes to marketing? Where did they get the 5-10% figure from? Why did they take a 5-10% estimate and drop it to 4% for the church?  Any justification or evidence or citations? Anything?

For J, where did the $854 per month come from? Why?  Citation?

It's a jumbled mess of numbers thrown onto a page without any justification or reasoning why. I can't verify anything. I'm supposed to just trust a group of people that is dedicated to attacking the church.

I don't trust their estimating skills. I don't trust my co-workers estimating skills. I don't trust my own estimating skills. This is why we give citations and describe justifications so others can double-check.

The Widows Mite folks argues for full transparency but provides little themselves. They withhold data and arguments in a manner designed to resist any kind of fact checking or peer review.

Edited May 17, 2023 by helix

[ksfisher]

1 hour ago, Diamondhands69 said:

The form is clear. Gre[y] areas pop up when you are lying.

Federal Code is rife with grey areas.  The book of Federal Code we use at my work is 2/3 code, and 1/3 guidance how to interpret the code.  Different inspectors will interpret the code in differently, occasionally conflicting, manners.

 

[Amulek]

44 minutes ago, bluebell said:

Gray areas are often those times where someone with some expertise says "this is how I am interpreting this and it appears to be allowed" and then someone with more authority interprets the same thing in a different way and has the power to declare that the previous "expert" was incorrect.

And, maddeningly, sometimes the person with the expertise who interprets it one way and the person with authority to interpret it another way happens to be the same flipping person!

Seriously, I remember one year where a state tax commissioner flip-flopped between two different positions four times in nearly as many months. It was completely ridiculous and resulted in loads of amended filings by everyone in the industry, multiple times over.

Also, I know this may be a little tangential, but it probably needs to be mentioned that just because a form is clear doesn't mean it is correct. I have seen state taxing authorities publish official forms / instructions and issue bulletins which were just (and I'm being as polite as possible here) embarrassingly wrong.   

 

[helix]

39 minutes ago, Amulek said:

And, maddeningly, sometimes the person with the expertise who interprets it one way and the person with authority to interpret it another way happens to be the same flipping person!

I'm still amazed that the IRS will often sue itself to get the court to interpret vague rules.

[Diamondhands69]

3 hours ago, ksfisher said:

Federal Code is rife with grey areas.  The book of Federal Code we use at my work is 2/3 code, and 1/3 guidance how to interpret the code.  Different inspectors will interpret the code in differently, occasionally conflicting, manners.

 

Have u seen a 13F? It is probably the most simple form the govt has. ANY licensed financial pro or CPA can easily navigate the form. The test to get a brokerage license makes this form look like first grade handwriting class. The church has problems with it because it was false info they were inputting. 
 

go check the link to the form I posted previously. I’m sure it is possible you can’t handle it, but any financial professional could fill it out while they are enjoying their lunch break. 

[bluebell]

9 minutes ago, Diamondhands69 said:

I’m sure it is possible you can’t handle it, but any financial professional could fill it out while they are enjoying their lunch break. 

Why suddenly so snarky? 

 

[Analytics]

12 hours ago, smac97 said:

[Quoting Sam Brunson] "Waddell disagreed—he said that the church takes money out of EPA 8 or 9 times a month.

"And the thing is, Nielson [sic] agreed with that assertion! But, he said, ‘Money’s going in and out of the cash accounts all the time. But Ensign Peak’s funds were never used for any charitable purpose, to my knowledge, the whole time I was there.’"

I get the feeling Brunson misunderstood what Nielsen was saying. Nielsen is saying that "the cash accounts" that had money going in and out were not part of Ensign Peak--they were part of the treasury of the Church itself. According to Nielsen, only excess money for long-term savings was transferred to Ensign Peaks.

However, Waddell did specifically say that the Church takes money out of EPA 8 or 9 times a month. 

Putting this all together, here is what I speculate: when the letter to an IRS Director came out, the Church's attorneys did carefully study Nielsen's accusations and did determine that they had at least some degree of merit--if investigated, Ensign Peak Advisors was at risk of possibly losing its tax exempt status. In response to that, the attorneys determined that the prudent thing to do would be to double-down on Ensign Peak Advisors and move the treasury to Ensign Peaks. Once the treasury was moved to Ensign Peaks, what Waddell said became true--money did move out of Ensign Peak a few times every week.

If I'm right about that and the treasury was moved to Ensign Peak, it would prove that the Church saw some validity in Nielsen's arguments and made adjustments to its structure to compensate. 

[Diamondhands69]

3 hours ago, bluebell said:

Why suddenly so snarky? 

 

Because if he looked at 13f he would know all he just said is irrelevant. It is probably the easiest form in the inventory. I even posted a link. A quick perusal is all it takes to see it doesn’t take a bunch of fancy jargon and a code book to complete. 
 

also.. there is no allegation the church filled it out incorrectly because it was so hard to figure out. The problem was they filled it with false information. 
 

Complexity is not the problem. The problem is honesty. 
 

 

[Diamondhands69]

8 hours ago, bluebell said:

Not necessarily. 

Gray areas are often those times where someone with some expertise says "this is how I am interpreting this and it appears to be allowed" and then someone with more authority interprets the same thing in a different way and has the power to declare that the previous "expert" was incorrect.

 

Roger Clark was the head guy at ensign peak forever. He is/was also the CEO of another investment company whose name escapes me. Anyway we looked up the other companies 13fs and looks like they are all filled out right. 
 

funny how he gets his own firm’s paperwork correct but can’t seem to get it right at ensign peak. 

[Teancum]

16 hours ago, helix said:

For B. What's the citation for BYU subsidies. This shouldn't be hard to cite.

For C, where did they get the 11,000 employees from, where's the citation for that?  What's the total amount, did they just multiply? The chart above just gives a big fat "C" with no total. 

For D, where did they get $1.1 and $1.2 billion from? Citation? The leaker in 2019 posted a slide giving a $1 billion figure. Does this group have new leaked information that it's now larger?

For E, where did they get 245 million sq ft of temples and chapels? Why did they take a $6 national average and just cut it in half to $3? Any citation or reason why?  Where did the $6 come from?

For G, where did they guess that a ward budget is $6,500? Any justification for just saying a stake gets twice that amount?

For H, where did they get that a seminary teacher only makes $46K a year? Is average salary at glassdoor.com an overall average salary or did glassdoor have insight into seminary totals? Did they factor in costs of seminary buildings anywhere? I don't see it in their estimations.

For I, where in the world are they getting that 4% of of the surplus from D goes to marketing? Where did they get the 5-10% figure from? Why did they take a 5-10% estimate and drop it to 4% for the church?  Any justification or evidence or citations? Anything?

For J, where did the $854 per month come from? Why?  Citation?

It's a jumbled mess of numbers thrown onto a page without any justification or reasoning why. I can't verify anything. I'm supposed to just trust a group of people that is dedicated to attacking the church.

I don't trust their estimating skills. I don't trust my co-workers estimating skills. I don't trust my own estimating skills. This is why we give citations and describe justifications so others can double-check.

The Widows Mite folks argues for full transparency but provides little themselves. They withhold data and arguments in a manner designed to resist any kind of fact checking or peer review.

Meh.Ok.  If I recall some of the team at The Widows Mite are active members and thus they would like to be anonymous. They talk about their methodology on the site.  There are also a number of Mormon Stories podcasts where a member and an accounting professor further explains the site and how they come up with their numbers.

If you really view the site and those behind it as an attack you are pretty thin skinned.

But guess what?  Your church could clear this all up if they were open with their finances as well as transparent.  But they are not.  So we just have our best estimates.  The Widow's mite does a good job  at that.  THe church could easily clear things up.  But they won't.  Bishop Waddell demonstrated that in the 60 Minutes spot.

 

By the way they do have a lnk to their sources:

https://widowsmitereport.wordpress.com/sources/

 

Also here is a link to their FAQs:

https://widowsmitereport.wordpress.com/faq/

 

 

 

[bluebell]

9 hours ago, Diamondhands69 said:

Roger Clark was the head guy at ensign peak forever. He is/was also the CEO of another investment company whose name escapes me. Anyway we looked up the other companies 13fs and looks like they are all filled out right. 
 

funny how he gets his own firm’s paperwork correct but can’t seem to get it right at ensign peak. 

This actually makes sense to me.  Because we aren’t talking about accidentally filling out the paperwork wrong. We’re talking about different choices based on different goals.

It sounds like the church was trying to do something that was on the line of what was allowed, because of their focus on privacy.  They believed what they were doing was legal but the SEC disagreed, and they are the final authority.

Most companies though, that don’t have the same priorities regarding privacy, are going to fill out their paperwork in the standard—no risk involved—way.

Like the way a person might fill out their personal taxes differently than they would do their taxes for a large complicated corporation with different tax goals.

[CA Steve]

15 minutes ago, bluebell said:

They believed what they were doing was legal

I don't get this. In order for them to think this was legal they would have to be really incompetent, consistently over a long period of time. Even then I think they would have to know they were lying. I see no indication the church hires anything but the best.

[helix]

1 hour ago, Teancum said:

There are also a number of Mormon Stories podcasts where a member and an accounting professor further explains the site and how they come up with their numbers.

So I need to go to listen through a long Mormon Stories podcast with hope the explanations are there?

>“But the plans were on display…”
>“On display? I eventually had to go down to the cellar to find them.”
>“That’s the display department.”
>“With a flashlight.”
>“Ah, well, the lights had probably gone.”
>“So had the stairs.”
>“But look, you found the notice, didn’t you?”
>“Yes,” said Arthur, “yes I did. It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying ‘Beware of the Leopard.”

--Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

1 hour ago, Teancum said:

By the way they do have a lnk to their sources:

https://widowsmitereport.wordpress.com/sources/

You haven't been reading. These aren't citations. If I'm looking for, say, the reason why he came up with a $6 per sq foot figure and claimed it's the national average, and then the reason they cut that in half to a $3 figure for the church, I'd have to read every URL in the that catch-all page hoping one of the links discusses it, And I'm virtually positive none do for many of the questions I posed prior. (I know this because the last time I asked for citations for particular data, he swooped in and said the sources weren't in the report, and then added three more URLs in the catch-all page instead of adding proper citations.)

Edited May 18, 2023 by helix

[Teancum]

Just now, helix said:

So I need to go to listen through a long Mormon Stories podcast with hope the explanations are there?

You can do whatever you want.  The episodes are linked at their site. I find their info compelling.  You apparently don't/  So what.  Like I said your church could easily clear all this up by being open and transparent about their finances.  But nope.....

 

So don't cry to me about it if people attempt to estimate the church's wealth and financial situation with limited access to the data. Till you come up with something better I thing  The Widow's Mite group does a pretty good job.

Just now, helix said:

 

You haven't been reading. These aren't citations. If I'm looking for, say, the reason why he came up with a $6 per sq foot figure and claimed it's the national average, and then the reason why they came up with a $3 per square foot figure, I have to read every URL in the catch all page hoping one discusses it, and I'm almost positive none do for many of the questions I posed prior.

So you decided that without even looking at them.  Got it.😏

[bluebell]

1 hour ago, CA Steve said:

I don't get this. In order for them to think this was legal they would have to be really incompetent, consistently over a long period of time. Even then I think they would have to know they were lying. I see no indication the church hires anything but the best.

All we have to go on is the church's statement on what happened:

“Since 2000, Ensign Peak received and relied upon legal counsel regarding how to comply with its reporting obligations while attempting to maintain the privacy of the portfolio. As a result, Ensign Peak established separate companies (LLCs) that each filed Forms 13F instead of a single aggregated filing. Ensign Peak and the church believe that all securities required to be reported were included in the filings by the separate companies,”

[helix]

1 hour ago, Teancum said:

So you decided that without even looking at them.  Got it.😏

I looked at it, analyzed it, found it was missing key citations, asked where these were, the main author's account swooped in and told me to search a government website. Then later added 3 more URLs to a catch-all sources page. That is their methodology.

 

[CA Steve]

1 hour ago, bluebell said:

All we have to go on is the church's statement on what happened:

“Since 2000, Ensign Peak received and relied upon legal counsel regarding how to comply with its reporting obligations while attempting to maintain the privacy of the portfolio. As a result, Ensign Peak established separate companies (LLCs) that each filed Forms 13F instead of a single aggregated filing. Ensign Peak and the church believe that all securities required to be reported were included in the filings by the separate companies,”

Wasn't leadership aware of that they were lying on the form? Wasn't that why the SEC fined leadership also?

[bluebell]

19 minutes ago, CA Steve said:

Wasn't leadership aware of that they were lying on the form? Wasn't that why the SEC fined leadership also?

Here's a bit more on what the church is stating happened:

Church and Ensign Peak leaders received legal counsel, the church statement said, that they could create a trust to own a separate limited liability company to file Forms 13F. That trust was formed in April 2001 and a single LLC filed its first disclosure, or Form 13F, in February 2003, the SEC said.

The SEC said that the LLC could do so only if Ensign Peak transferred operational investment discretion to the LLC, but the SEC alleged that it did not.

The church fully cooperated with SEC officials in active discussions with the commission and offered the settlement. SEC commissioners announced Tuesday it had settled charges by accepting the church’s offer and ordered the church and Ensign Peak Advisors Inc. to “cease and desist” the previous reporting practices they already had abandoned. The church and Ensign Peak have followed the correct filing procedure for 13 quarters now.

From what I can find, church leadership wasn't fined, but the church was fined 1 million dollars.  The alleged wrongdoings (which encompase the full 5 million dollar fine) were failure to file forms and misstating Ensign Peak's control.  Misstating could be interpreted as lying but I don't think the SEC makes moral judgements of that type in their findings. 

As I understand it, whether a misstatement is on purpose or accidental, it's all the same to the SEC.  

[Analytics]

36 minutes ago, bluebell said:

Here's a bit more on what the church is stating happened:

Church and Ensign Peak leaders received legal counsel, the church statement said, that they could create a trust to own a separate limited liability company to file Forms 13F. That trust was formed in April 2001 and a single LLC filed its first disclosure, or Form 13F, in February 2003, the SEC said.

The SEC said that the LLC could do so only if Ensign Peak transferred operational investment discretion to the LLC, but the SEC alleged that it did not.

The church fully cooperated with SEC officials in active discussions with the commission and offered the settlement. SEC commissioners announced Tuesday it had settled charges by accepting the church’s offer and ordered the church and Ensign Peak Advisors Inc. to “cease and desist” the previous reporting practices they already had abandoned. The church and Ensign Peak have followed the correct filing procedure for 13 quarters now.

From what I can find, church leadership wasn't fined, but the church was fined 1 million dollars.  The alleged wrongdoings (which encompase the full 5 million dollar fine) were failure to file forms and misstating Ensign Peak's control.  Misstating could be interpreted as lying but I don't think the SEC makes moral judgements of that type in their findings. 

As I understand it, whether a misstatement is on purpose or accidental, it's all the same to the SEC.  

A key piece of understanding this is that the second the Church realized their reporting practices would be scrutinized, they abandoned them.

I think the "misstatements" are best understood as white lies: the Church knew it was saying things that were false, but they did it anyway for two reasons:

1. The lies didn't hurt anybody
2. They thought they could get away with it

The second they realized they wouldn't get away with it, they abandoned the dishonest reporting practices.

[bluebell]

Just now, Analytics said:

A key piece of understanding this is that the second the Church realized their reporting practices would be scrutinized, they abandoned them.

I think the "misstatements" are best understood as white lies: the Church knew it was saying things that were false, but they did it anyway for two reasons:

1. The lies didn't hurt anybody
2. They thought they could get away with it

The second they realized they wouldn't get away with it, they abandoned the dishonest reporting practices.

Or, a key piece of understanding this is that the second the church realized from the SEC that their reported practices were not in accordance with filing rules, they changed them.

The church and its affiliate, Ensign Peak Advisors, Inc., adjusted their practices in 2019 after learning about SEC concerns and complied with rules that require them to disclose the church’s entire stock portfolio in a single set of quarterly filing forms, the SEC said.

There is room to interpret all of this as the church having ill intent but it's not a given.  It's not how it must be interpreted.

[ttribe]

1 hour ago, bluebell said:

Here's a bit more on what the church is stating happened:

Church and Ensign Peak leaders received legal counsel, the church statement said, that they could create a trust to own a separate limited liability company to file Forms 13F. That trust was formed in April 2001 and a single LLC filed its first disclosure, or Form 13F, in February 2003, the SEC said.

The SEC said that the LLC could do so only if Ensign Peak transferred operational investment discretion to the LLC, but the SEC alleged that it did not.

The church fully cooperated with SEC officials in active discussions with the commission and offered the settlement. SEC commissioners announced Tuesday it had settled charges by accepting the church’s offer and ordered the church and Ensign Peak Advisors Inc. to “cease and desist” the previous reporting practices they already had abandoned. The church and Ensign Peak have followed the correct filing procedure for 13 quarters now.

From what I can find, church leadership wasn't fined, but the church was fined 1 million dollars.  The alleged wrongdoings (which encompase the full 5 million dollar fine) were failure to file forms and misstating Ensign Peak's control.  Misstating could be interpreted as lying but I don't think the SEC makes moral judgements of that type in their findings. 

As I understand it, whether a misstatement is on purpose or accidental, it's all the same to the SEC.  

The facts surrounding how employees were manipulated into signing the documents weighs the evidence more in favor of an intentional act, IMO.

Edited May 18, 2023 by ttribe

[CA Steve]

2 hours ago, bluebell said:

From what I can find, church leadership wasn't fined, but the church was fined 1 million dollars.  The alleged wrongdoings (which encompase the full 5 million dollar fine) were failure to file forms and misstating Ensign Peak's control.  Misstating could be interpreted as lying but I don't think the SEC makes moral judgements of that type in their findings. 

I understood the fine was broken down into parts with 1 million leveled specifically at church leadership because they were aware of the failures.

Calling them "alleged" is simply spin. It happened.

And, I think the lack of moral judgement on the SEC's end is irrelevant. 

[Analytics]

2 hours ago, bluebell said:

Or, a key piece of understanding this is that the second the church realized from the SEC that their reported practices were not in accordance with filing rules, they changed them.

The church and its affiliate, Ensign Peak Advisors, Inc., adjusted their practices in 2019 after learning about SEC concerns and complied with rules that require them to disclose the church’s entire stock portfolio in a single set of quarterly filing forms, the SEC said.

There is room to interpret all of this as the church having ill intent but it's not a given.  It's not how it must be interpreted.

If you look at the timeline, first some independent researchers figured out the LLC’s were all owned by the Church. They published this on the Internet. The very next quarter, the church changed its reporting practices. About a year later, the SEC investigation commenced.

The Church didn’t need special instructions that they were supposed to tell the truth on the signed documents.