Here’s what you should know about next year’s tax rates on long-term capital gains. - iStock/MarketWatch illustration Attention, investors. Income-tax rules are here for capital gains in 2026. The Internal Revenue Service on Thursday released a batch of annual tax-code adjustments, including the income ranges needed to notch the preferential tax rate on capital gains. Most Read from MarketWatch 2026 marks a major year for taxes. It will be the first full year with President Donald Trump’s sweeping tax ...

This effectively means that you, as the beneficiary, would be responsible for paying capital-gains tax on any appreciation when you eventually sell the asset, not the trust. “So if the trustee distributed the stock/funds instead of cash, there is a potential tax-rate arbitrage to play depending on the facts,” Pantekidis says. “We go through this with our clients yearly, especially younger beneficiaries that have little to no income.”“If beneficiaries receive trust assets ‘in kind,’ then normally, when a tru ...