Swiss firms have bagged major business from global brands such as GSK, Novartis and Crédit Suisse this year, while their Asia ventures have come good. The legal minds behind the Glaxo-SmithKline and Novartis asset swap, global banking investigations, Schaeffler’s €2bn high yield bond issuance and Dufry’s £1.05bn takeover of Nuance… – Continue reading
Both internal and external factors threaten politics, economics Hong Kong’s run of good luck is running out. One obvious sign is the increasing interference of Beijing in its domestic affairs, most recently using tame Chief Executive C.Y. Leung and a clique of yes-men to interfere in a senior academic appointment… – Continue reading
G20 finance ministers have endorsed a package of measures to tackle corporate tax avoidance, but questions remain about whether certain countries will follow through on the plans or leave loopholes multinationals can exploit. The ministers agreed to back proposals drawn up by the OECD, which aim to shake up rules… – Continue reading
NEW DELHI: Within days of getting a favourable verdict in the Rs 8,500 crore transfer pricing case from the Bombay High Court, Vodafone Group CEO Vittorio Colao will call on Finance Minister Arun Jaitley this week. Colao will visit India on October 14 and is scheduled to meet Jaitley the… – Continue reading
Staff at Facebook’s UK arm took home an average of more than £210,000 last year in pay and bonuses, while their employer paid just £4,327 in corporation tax. Facebook made an accounting loss of £28.5m in Britain in 2014, after paying out more than £35m to its 362 staff in… – Continue reading
The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) will grant income tax exemption on interest payment to ICBC bank of China regarding coal-fired energy projects, subject to agreement and signing of third protocol between Pakistan and China under avoidance of double taxation treaty. Sources told Business Recorder here on Friday that the… – Continue reading
As a newly-elected Australian lawmaker a decade ago, Malcolm Turnbull wrote an unsolicited 52-page proposal to reform the tax system. The report and its 281 recommendations were dismissed by the government and his costings called into question. Now, a month after replacing Tony Abbott as leader of the world’s 12th-largest… – Continue reading
DBS Bank’s Chinese unit has been chosen to be among the first group of banks to test a new international payment system that promises faster transactions for businesses using the yuan. The Cross-border International Payment System (CIPS), launched yesterday, is seen as a big step towards making the yuan a… – Continue reading
The Department of Justice announced today that Schaffhauser Kantonalbank (SHKB) has reached a resolution under the department’s Swiss Bank Program. The Swiss Bank Program, which was announced on Aug. 29, 2013, provides a path for Swiss banks to resolve potential criminal liabilities in the United States. Swiss banks eligible to… – Continue reading
Today, counsel for the taxpayer and the Franchise Tax Board (“FTB”) argued before the California Supreme Court in The Gillette Company & Subs. v. California Franchise Tax Board. This case has been watched closely by taxpayers and tax practitioners on a national level since briefing was completed nearly two years… – Continue reading
Singapore has given the thumbs up to an international plan that aims to clamp down on tax avoidance by multinational firms, reports the Straits Times. The Republic says if the plan is soundly implemented, it will help foster free and fair economic competition. Singapore agrees with the main principle of… – Continue reading
Senior tax executives are preparing for changes in the tax landscape as a result of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development’s base erosion and profit shifting project. A new survey by Ernst & Young, presented Thursday at its 34th Annual International Tax Conference, found 88 percent of tax directors… – Continue reading
New Zealand needs to be careful not to get out of step with the rest of the world in implementing tax changes on multinational companies seeking to minimise their tax obligations, Deloitte Dunedin tax partner Peter Truman says. The Government this week released a report on Base Erosion and Profit… – Continue reading
Multinationals selling more than $75k into Australia asked to comply. The Australian government has released its revised exposure draft of legislation that would see GST added to all locally-bought digital products and services sold by overseas vendors by July 2017. In May this year former Treasurer Joe Hockey revealed plans… – Continue reading
Fenergo, the leading provider of Client Lifecycle Management solutions for institutional banks, has today published key findings from new research commissioned from the Aite Group which suggests that financial institutions are struggling to manage regulatory compliance and entity data management obligations across multiple jurisdictions. (Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20150114/724322) The research finds that… – Continue reading
Hervé Falciani, who exposed the global offshore industry with the HSBC data leak, is facing prosecution under skewed Swiss laws for data theft and espionage. This is his story. Swiss justice hounds those who breach banking secrecy even if in doing so they expose rogue banks. In the past decade,… – Continue reading
The Australian Tax Office will open negotiations with 80 multinational companies to encourage them to “restructure” in order to pay more tax on profits generated in Australia. The move represents a near tripling of the ATO’s multinational watch list after it embedded staff inside 30 companies to learn more about… – Continue reading
A senior officials say they have no legal jurisdiction over the accounts maintained in foreign countries and governments there can cooperate only in case of established criminal conspiracy While the government has threatened rigorous action against black money hoarders after tepid response to its one-time compliance window, it may have… – Continue reading
NEW DELHI: India has found global allies in its fight against black money. Germany, France, Switzerland, Singapore, Mauritius and the British Virgin Islands are among those that are providing information, or will soon start doing so, on assets held by Indians, helping the Narendra Modi government in its campaign to… – Continue reading
Nearly three-quarters of Fortune 500 companies booked their profits to tax havens last year, with just 30 companies accounting for 62 percent of earnings stashed offshore, according to a new report. The report, “Offshore Shell Games,” released Tuesday by the U.S. PIRG Education Fund and Citizens for Tax Justice, found… – Continue reading
Oct. 6 (BusinessDesk) – Fonterra Cooperative Group is likely to be among some 20 New Zealand companies left dealing with increased red tape to comply with wide-ranging reforms to corporate tax rules proposed by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development and expected to be endorsed by the world’s 20… – Continue reading
The OECD-G20 plan to stop multinational tax avoidance could put companies in the middle of border disputes between revenue authorities, tax experts have warned. But civil society groups say the plan has not gone far enough and could make it easier for some multinationals to dodge tax. Treasurer Scott Morrison… – Continue reading
Six of the nation’s largest banks — Bank of America, Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs — utilize a combined 395 known tax havens to avoid potential tax bills in the billions, according to a new analysis. In total, the big six banks kept $126 billion… – Continue reading
72% of Fortune 500 companies have offshore subsidiaries PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — More than 72% of Fortune 500 companies have subsidiaries in offshore tax havens to take advantage of tax loopholes, a new study by the Oregon State Public Interest Research Group showed. Oregon-based companies in the Fortune 500 are… – Continue reading
The 500 largest American companies hold more than $2.1 trillion in accumulated profits offshore to avoid U.S. taxes and would collectively owe an estimated $620 billion in U.S. taxes if they repatriated the funds, according to a study released on Tuesday. The study, by two left-leaning non-profit groups, found that… – Continue reading
The Irish government is set to make further changes to the country’s corporate tax regime as it seeks to align itself with a global initiative to clamp down on corporate tax avoidance, reports the Financial Times. The change being considered will oblige companies that have global headquarters in Ireland to… – Continue reading
Last year at this time, news about “tax inversions” was grabbing headlines – cases where large U.S. multinationals would buy a foreign company in a tax-friendly jurisdiction, and then relocate its headquarters to reap the tax arbitrage benefits. The Obama administration responded to the rash of high-profile inversions with new… – Continue reading
Daily Herald Reports Specialty drug manufacturer Horizon Pharma, which moved its corporate headquarters from Deerfield to Ireland in 2014, announced it is relocating its U.S. headquarters from Deerfield to Lake Forest as part of a company expansion. The Dublin-based company reported it signed a long-term sublease on a 160,000-square-foot building… – Continue reading
A two-year effort to clamp down on multinational tax rorts will come to a head in Paris overnight. The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development will finalise recommendations on its 15-point “Beps” action plan, ahead of a meeting of G20 finance ministers in Lima in Peru that starts on Thursday…. – Continue reading
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Sunday said that people who had not declared their undisclosed assets in the 90-day compliance window offered by the government will now face the law including penalty and sentence upto 10 years while 638 people who had made the declaration can “now sleep well.” In… – Continue reading
Two big offshore deals kick off the week. The first is the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement. The long-awaited deal is a bit like the Jabberwocky poem in Alice in Wonderland – the alarmism means the political atmosphere is full of strange and threatening noises which only leave a general impression that… – Continue reading
PARIS–Global tech firms such as Amazon.com Inc. are already preparing for new tax rules that could force them to pay corporate taxes in more countries where they operate, but are also girding for what some say will be more fights with–and between–national tax authorities. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and… – Continue reading
NEW DELHI, OCT 4: Finance Minister Arun Jaitley today warned that those who did not declare overseas black money during compliance window will face the consequences as the government will receive information about their wealth under automatic exchange of information, while others who took advantage of the scheme to come… – Continue reading
The world’s richest nations will launch a huge crackdown on multinational tax avoidance on Monday as part of the biggest shake-up of international tax rules for decades. The move could lead to a multi- billion pound gain for Chancellor George Osborne and higher tax bills for a raft of blue-chip… – Continue reading
EU member states to reveal information on tax rulings offered to companies Ireland’s corporate tax regime is to come under renewed scrutiny next week as EU finance ministers sign off on a proposal obliging member states to reveal information on tax rulings offered to companies. EU finance ministers meeting in… – Continue reading
An offshore bank account is a must for many internationally mobile expats operating in the UAE and Middle East. But finding the right bank with the right extras as well as high service standards isn’t easy. There are plenty of big names to choose from, including the global operators Barclays,… – Continue reading
It’s not just about the pig’s head. Britain’s headline writers went into high porcine pun mode last month over a suggestion that Prime Minister David Cameron, while still in university, had taken part in a club-initiation ritual that bizarrely incorporated part of a pig carcass. The second-hand allegation appears in… – Continue reading
George Osborne’s plans to tighten tax rules for wealthy foreigners living in Britain will leave many offshore trusts outside the UK tax net, according to proposals published on Wednesday, reports the Financial Times. The Treasury’s consultation on “carefully targeted” changes to the rules for “non-doms” — people who live in… – Continue reading
Using companies incorporated in international financial centres (IFCs) in structuring financial transactions, capital raisings and corporate structures has long been popular in Asia, particularly Hong Kong (itself an IFC). Following the energetic expansion of the PRC economy and assisted in part by the relaxation of PRC regulations in relation to… – Continue reading
SOUTH Africa has ranked higher than several developed countries in an assessment of money “hidden” in HSBC Swiss bank accounts, a report showed on Wednesday. “The money connected to SA was higher than money connected to France, eight times higher than that of the US, and 3.5 times more than… – Continue reading
SEOUL/SEJONG, Oct. 1 (Yonhap) — A professor of international business law at Boston University has been tapped to represent South Korea in a tax dispute case involving a Netherlands-based company, the government said Thursday. Hanocal Holding B.V., a Dutch paper company belonging to the International Petroleum Investment Company (IPIC) of… – Continue reading
Tens of millions of pounds worth of property in St Austell is owned by companies based in offshore tax havens. They include large parts of Fore Street in the town centre; the beaches at Carlyon Bay, and dozens of individual buildings throughout St Austell and the clay country. NHS Kernow’s… – Continue reading
After a whistleblower leaked the details of secret Swiss accounts at global bank HSBC earlier this year, the strongest reaction came from advanced economies, where governments launched efforts to reclaim tax money hidden abroad. But a new analysis by the Financial Transparency Coalition and Christian Aid shows that the financial… – Continue reading
Under pressure to find resources for his promises of sweeping tax cuts, Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi is hoping to raise billions of euros by forcing multinational Internet firms to pay taxes on profits generated in Italy. Treasury Undersecretary Enrico Zanetti said a so-called “Google Tax” could yield up to… – Continue reading
BEIJING/SHANGHAI (Reuters) – China has halved sales tax on small cars to revive growth in the world’s biggest automobile market, a move likely to provide a limited boost to carmakers including Volkswagen AG (VOWG_p.DE), the company embroiled in a global diesel emissions scandal. The cut in sales tax on cars… – Continue reading
The Yomiuri Shimbun The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development will establish a comprehensive package of international rules to clamp down on tax saving tactics by multinational companies, The Yomiuri Shimbun learned Tuesday. The pillar of the package is to halt tax-saving practices like unrealistic lending and borrowing as well… – Continue reading
30 September 2015 -New, detailed examination of the SwissLeaks files by Christian Aid working with the US-based Financial Transparency Coalition (FTC) graphically reveals the harm tax haven secrecy does to the economies of developing countries. The SwissLeaks scandal involves thousands of secret accounts at HSBC’s Swiss subsidiary HSBC Private Bank… – Continue reading
Tax laws are lagging behind the digital economy. As changes in the digital realm continue to outpace the speed at which legislators can work, and borders increasingly blur because of the internet, SA needs to play catch-up when it comes to tax. Currently, the only digital tax of any consequence… – Continue reading
WASHINGTON, D.C. — United States authorities have begun the exchange of information with Mexico on all Mexicans with bank accounts or investments in the U.S. who have obtained more than $10 USD in annual interest. With the implementation of the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA), Mexico plans to deliver… – Continue reading
Gabriel Zucman, one of 3 French economists who in recent times have published extensive research on wealth and equality, in a book, ‘The Hidden Wealth of Nations: The Scourge of Tax Havens,’ published this month, estimates that 8% of the world’s financial wealth — some US$7.6tn — is hidden in… – Continue reading
