I have been doing a lot of day trading the last few years. In 2013 I made a lot of money (tens of thousands in profits), but in 2014 I did poorly and lost tens of thousands.
My CPA said that due to the volume of trades, my trading could be considered a business, and when he filed my 2013 tax return prior to April 15, 2014, he made the mark to market election for me. This is good because without it, I would be limited to a $3000 investment loss deduction per year, and it would take well over a decade before I fully deducted all of my trading losses.
For my 2014 tax return, I filed for an extension. Unfortunately my CPA did not have time to finish it by the Oct 15, 2015 deadline. But his secretary told me that since I'm going to be getting a refund, there won't be any penalties for filing the return after Oct 15, 2015.
He previously told me that he would file my 2014 tax return to claim an NOL for the trading losses, and that would also require amending my 2012 and 2013 tax returns. He said that he would have to file the 2014 return first, and then file the 2012 and 2013 amended returns later. He said he couldn't file them at the same time - he would need to file the amended returns 30-45 days after the 2014 return for some reason.
Is it true that there is a rule that prevents him from filing the 2014 return and the 2012 and 2013 amended returns at the same time? My CPA frequently gets sidetracked by other things and I wouldn't be surprised if he filed the 2014 return and then didn't get around to filing the 2012 and 2013 amended returns until several months later. I wouldn't want to wait that long to get the entire refund. I would also worry if I'd be running up against any deadlines pertaining to amending returns or the NOL.