> Your investment may rise in value. is it a good stock or a junk stock?
Junk. I'd rather sell & reallocate the capital elsewhere.
Hmm...so it sounds like one vote for each approach (aka fanfare thinks cost basis could be the original purchase cost basis, Mike thinks cost basis should be value at the time of removal). TD's staff did also say the former (actually on a couple different calls), though of course their disclaimer: "we're not tax professionals."
I think my takeaway is that it's potentially a little ambiguous, we don't have a 100% concrete IRS rule that says one approach is right and the other is wrong, and one could probably make a reasonable argument for either treatment. Does that sound right?
