What Price Patents?What Price Patents?

Rorie M. Sherman Editor in Chief

David T. Leibell and Daniel L. Daniels, partners in the Stamford, Conn., office of Cummings & Lockwood LLC, report that planners have been buzzing for months about patents of tax strategies. First, the John Rowe case settled in March, 2007. Then news that another tax patent had been filed made it clear that this trend will continue.

Rowe is the case that publicized the fact that tax strategies can be patented. An executive at the Hartford, Conn.-based insurance giant Aetna, Inc., John Rowe placed Aetna options in a grantor retained annuity trust (GRAT). The Wealth Transfer Group, LLC, of Altamonte Springs, Fla., sued Rowe, alleging that his GRAT plan infringed on Wealth Transfer's patented strategy of placi...