1.   But a sale would saddle the company with a big taxable gain.

2.   By doing so, many could take the losses on their income tax returns and avoid receiving the distribution of taxable gains.

3.   For example, try to avoid selling securities that would generate a taxable gain, Pond advised.

4.   In a real sale, a loss can be used to offset other taxable gains.

5.   It also sells stocks at a loss to minimize taxable gains.

6.   Mutual funds may have to sell shares to meet investor redemptions, creating taxable gains typically distributed to investors at year-end.

7.   Occasionally, they also surprise their shareholders with taxable gains, because they must sell shares of companies that are deleted from indexes and buy shares of their replacements.

8.   Others say such studies should use after-tax returns, because trading by active managers generates more taxable gains.

9.   President Clinton did fight off the House-backed provision for indexing taxable gains to inflation.

10.   Selling the shares would give you taxable gains.