On January 19, 2017, the IRS and the Treasury Department released final regulations on natural resource activities as qualifying income under section 7704 of the Internal Revenue Code.  The final regulations are a great improvement over the proposed regulations issued in May 2015, responding to many of the comments made by MLPA and its members.  Most importantly, they remove the “exclusive list” aspect that allowed only specifically listed activities to qualify, and make a number of changes in the refining and processing definitions.  They will be published in the Federal Register on January 24.  To download the text of the final regulations, click here.