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Commissioner, 89 T.C. at 987, 988, 991, that the taxpayer (1) was
looking for an investment which would produce significant income
for his retirement years, (2) reasonably relied on the advice of
his accountant, financial adviser, and attorney to enter into the
disputed transaction (a tax shelter involving cattle breeding),
and (3) contemplated that he would recover the purchase price of
the two herds in which he invested. Despite these findings which
suggested the presence of a profit motive, we concluded that the
taxpayer’s deficiencies were subject to the higher rate of
interest under section 6621(c), i.e., that the taxpayer had a
substantial underpayment attributable to a “tax-motivated
transaction”. Cherin v. Commissioner, 89 T.C. at 1001. We
reached our conclusion in Cherin even though the handle the
Congress chose, “tax-motivated transaction”, suggested the
importance of the taxpayer’s motives. Instead of focusing on the
connotations that logically flowed from that handle, we focused
on the relevant statutory language, which set forth what the term
“tax-motivated transaction” “means”. Sec. 6621(c)(3).
In the instant case, in restricting the allowance rule of
section 163(a), the Congress chose the term “personal interest”,
and the Congress told us what that term “means” in section
163(h)(2). As relevant herein, the term “personal interest”
means “any interest allowable as a deduction under this chapter
other than–-* * * interest paid or accrued on indebtedness
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