6 Tips to Manage and Mitigate the Alternative Minimum Tax on Incentive Stock Options

Incentive stock options are a type of equity compensation you may receive as part of your overall compensation package. Incentive stock options, or ISOs, allow you to buy company stock at a fixed price for a set period of time, regardless of the current fair market value of the stock. In the best circumstances, incentive stock options can be a tool to generate significant wealth if...

If you are on the receiving end of an equity compensation award, you may be overwhelmed by the amount of new information, jargon, and rules coming your way. You might also feel uncertain about how new.

Incentive stock options are a powerful compensation tool that can help you grow your wealth. Companies award them to employees as a retention vehicle, to reward specific successes or as an incentive when trying to attract new employees. There are several advantages to incentive stock options. Because they can provide you with a significant opportunity,...

If you have stock options, then you can access an asset that provides you with a choice. Very literally, a stock option is an option; it’s a form of compensation that gives you the right (but not the obligation) to buy shares of company stock at a set price. Acting on this choice is known...

If you have employee stock options, you need to determine what kind you have: incentive stock options (ISO) or non-qualified stock options (NQSO). The differences go far beyond their names. ISOs may provide tax advantages for you, assuming you meet certain requirements. For this reason, many people prefer incentive stock options over NQSOs. But with...

I’m passionate about using my experience to help people like you understand what to do with employee stock options, RSUs, and other forms of equity compensation. I spend a lot of time developing resources to educate on this topic because I believe it’s important that you know how to best leverage this part of your...

Before you do anything with your incentive stock options, you need to get clear on how exercising those ISOs could affect your assets and what will it cost you in terms of real money. You need to know the cost of exercising your options, for example, or what you might pay in alternative minimum tax....

The alternative minimum tax (AMT) acts as a sort of parallel tax system to the regular federal income tax system. For taxpayers, this means they need to calculate their income twice: once under the regular tax rules and a second time under AMT. After running this calculation, taxpayers then pay whichever is highest. AMT was...

The choice of when to exercise your incentive stock options can be a difficult one, with serious implications for financial planning and taxes. When your company is still pre-IPO, that opens up an entirely separate set of concerns that you may need to be aware of. The issues associated with pre-IPO incentive stock options (ISOs)...

Incentive stock options (ISOs) are a form of compensation distributed by a company to their employees. Typically, companies use ISOs as a vehicle to retain top employees, reward specific milestones or successes or as an incentive when hiring new employees. ISOs can be a lucrative long-term compensation benefit, particularly if you work for a company...