Popular Silicon Valley Tax Strategy Gets Warning From Treasury

The Treasury Department is looking into curtailing a popular strategy that lets venture capitalists and others in Silicon Valley avoid billions of dollars in taxes, according to a top department official.

The practice, known as “stacking,” allows early investors in startups to multiply a recently expanded capital gains exemption — one that allows investors, owners of companies, founders and early employees of startups to skip millions of dollars of capital gains taxes — by assigning stock to other family members through trusts.

Kenneth Kies, Treasury’s assistant secretary for tax policy, said Wednesday that the department was working on guidance ...