recharacterization
recharacterization. A court’s determination that an insider’s loan to an entity in liquidation (such as a corporation or partnership) should be treated as a capital contribution, not as a loan, thereby entitling the insider to only part of the liquidation proceeds payable after all the business’s debts have been discharged. • Factors influencing this determination include the amount of capital initially available, the ability of the entity to obtain loans from outside sources, how long the entity has existed, the treatment of the loan in the entity’s business records, and past treatment of similar transactions made to that entity by an insider.
