Each year, the IRS reports tax return filings and refunds on a weekly basis, starting at the end of January until the April 15 deadline. This year, in response to the ongoing coronavirus outbreak, the US Department of the Treasury (of which the IRS is a division) announced that the deadline to file (and more importantly, to pay) has been extended to July 15. In this report, we look at what happened in the 16th week of the 2020 tax filing season. As of May 15, 2020:

• The IRS had received 130.5 million tax returns and processed 117.9 million. The number of returns received was down 8.2%, while those processed slid by 14.3%. The number of tax filings has dropped year over year as taxpayers take advantage of the 90-day filing extension granted by the IRS in the wake of the coronavirus crisis.
• Of the returns filed already, 90.3% were filed electronically. Of those, 50.4% were prepared by tax professionals, and the remaining 49.6% were self-prepared.
• With the IRS temporarily closing all Taxpayer Assistance Centers and suspending all in-person customer services nationwide, a high number of taxpayers used the IRS website for information: The site logged about 1.2 billion visits, up 150.4% year over year.
• A total of 88.2 million refunds had been issued as of May 15, totaling $245.1 billion and averaging $2,778 each. The number of refunds issued was down 13.9%, and the total amount refunded was down 12.4%, year over year. However, the average refund grew 1.8% year over year.
• Of those refunds issued, 83.2% were paid using direct deposit. The average direct deposit refund was $2,921, up 1.8% year over year.

The IRS data are shown in the table below. [caption id="attachment_110233" align="aligncenter" width="700"] Source: IRS[/caption]   The graph below shows total refunds increasing at a 1.2% CAGR during 2015–2019. [caption id="attachment_110234" align="aligncenter" width="700"] Source: IRS[/caption]   Economic Impact Payments The US Department of the Treasury and the IRS released updated figures on Economic Impact Payments, announcing that nearly 152 million Americans have received stimulus checks worth over $258 billion, as of May 22, 2020. The IRS has provided a state-by-state breakdown for Economic Impact Payments, which show that as of May 22, California had received the highest number of payments, with 16.9 million Californians receiving around $27.9 billion in total. Texas received the second-highest number of payments, with 12.4 million individuals receiving a total of more than $21.6 billion, followed by Florida, New York and Pennsylvania (as shown in Figure 3). [caption id="attachment_110235" align="aligncenter" width="700"] *As of May 22, 2020
Source: IRS[/caption]