Came across an interesting story involving a method of greatly reducing one’s RMD, but I have a hard time believing it would actually work, and couldn’t find anything on an internet search, so thought I might ask here.

Let’s say an individual is turning 73 next (2025) year and so has a Uniform Table life expectancy of 26.5 years. This person’s TIRA balance as of Dec 15 of this year is $1,000,000 and assuming that would be the balance as of close of business Dec 31, this person’s RMD for 2025 would be $37,736. But let’s say this person did a TIRA 60 day rollover  on Dec 15 of 900,000, leaving $100,000 in the TIRA, and then redeposited the $900,000 back into an IRA set up at another IRA custodian on Feb 10, 2025. Would the RMD then be calculated based on the 12/31/2024 $100,000 balance which would be $3,774 with no RMD due on the newly set up IRA that would be receiving the rollover $900,000?

Now, I know an RMD may not be rolled over and generally must be the first dollars withdrawn from a TIRA. But in 2024 there is no RMD and the new receiving IRA custodian does not know if the newly received TIRA rollover deposit has already been RMD’d or not.

Can this be done as an RMD reduction strategy? My understanding of the IRA RMD rules tells me it cannot, so what am I missing? The only catch-point I can think of is the receiving IRA custodian might require something from the previous IRA custodian that the 2025 RMD has been removed from the rolled over amount….but again, I cannot find that written anywhere.