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The coronavirus stimulus package, known as the CARES Act, working its way through Congress is expected to waive required minimum distributions (RMDs) from retirement savings accounts for 2020, granting a reprieve for retirees age 70½ and older who might otherwise be required to sell low and take distributions just when the stock market has nosedived in recent weeks.

The Senate’s $2 trillion coronavirus-relief bill that passed Wednesday night includes breaks for Americans whose retirement accounts have been battered by the stock-market meltdown.

The House of Representatives is expected to pass the package on Friday.Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said President Trump would sign the package as it was written Wednesday.

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The market’s recent plunge has been brutal.

But for people with traditional individual retirement accounts, the silver lining is that today’s lower account balances can be used to reduce income-tax bills in retirement.

The key is a strategy known as the Roth conversion.This allows account owners to transfer some or all of the money in a tax-deferred IRA to a Roth IRA, a retirement account into which you contribute after-tax dollars and get tax-free withdrawals.

This measure "will help lots of people avoid a tax bill on IRA value that has vanished," IRA expert Ed Slott tells ThinkAdvisor.

“You want the best deal, like when you buy anything,” said Ed Slott, CPA and founder of Ed Slott & Co.in Rockville Centre, New York

Ed Slott, founder of IRAhelp.com, joins Yahoo Finance's The Final Round to discuss the potential benefits of doing a Roth 401 (k) conversion amid coronavirus driven market volatility.

"You don't really have a loss until you sell," said Ed Slott, a certified public accountant and retirement-plan expert."Often the worst thing to do is sell out of fear."

“You could take little crumbs out, and let it grow tax-deferred over decades,” said Ed Slott, a certified public accountant and I.R.A.expert in Rockville Centre, N.Y

IRAhelp.com's Ed Slott joins our hosts Sandy Block and Ryan Ermey to explain how the SECURE Act could be impacting your retirement plans.

Congress passed important retirement legislation just before the holidays that has sent financial planners and tax professionals scrambling, because the law's impact on people with significant retirement savings is nearly immediate.