Int'l Tax News

By Joe Kirwin

Paolo Gentiloni has hiswork cut out for him as the EU's next tax czar, succeeding France's Pierre Moscovici.

By Hamza Ali and Isabel Gottlieb

A global plan to rewrite how the digital economy is taxed could create new conflicts between countries hoping for a bigger bite of multinationals' profits.

By Joshwingrove and Caitlinwebber

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin told reporters that trade talkswith France are goingwell and that the administration is reaching out to industry groups on digital tax proposals over the comingweeks.

By Jan Stojaspal

Poland has delayed plans to roll out its own digital tax on global tech companies.

By Siraphob Thanthong-Knight

Thailand's new stimulus package aimed at attracting companies and manufacturers to the countrywill be submitted for Cabinet's approval on Sept. 10, Kobsak Pootrakool, a deputy secretary-general in the Thai premier's office, said after an economic ministers' meeting in Bangkok.

The United States is meetingwith technology and other companies as it considers its options following a rowwith Paris over France's tax on big internet firms, the U.S. Treasury secretary said on Monday. Steven Mnuchin told reporters at thewhite House that effortswere ongoing after the two sides agreed at the G7 summit to seek an agreement in the next 90 days,with digital companies meetingwith U.S. Treasury officials thisweek and multinational firms coming nextweek.

Mexico is in talks to extend a sales tax to foreign online businesses so that they pay their fair share to Latin America's second biggest economy, the government said on Monday, in a move that could affect companies like Amazon.com Inc, Uber Technologies Inc and Airbnb Inc.

The move from principle-based approaches to mechanical-based approaches could expose multinationals to permanent instances of over-taxation or double taxation under BEPS Action 4 across jurisdictions.

Ireland has released a responses document on an ongoing consultation on an update to the country's transfer pricing rules. In February 2019, a public consultationwas launched to gather the views of stakeholders regarding a proposed update of Ireland's transfer pricing rules. The update is intended to respond to recommendations from the Coffey review and is also intended to incorporate the 2017 OECD Transfer Pricing Guidelines into Irish legislation.

The pace of tax reform has slowed across most leading economies, a new report from the OECD says, calling for bolder tax reforms to address future challenges. Tax Policy Reforms 2019 describes the latest tax reforms across all OECD countries, aswell as in Argentina, Indonesia, and South Africa. The report identifies major tax policy trends and highlights that fewer countries have introduced comprehensive tax reform packages in 2019 comparedwith previous years.

Businesses areworried that greater transparencywould increase risks and uncertainty if there is a UK general election in the comingweeks and the Labour Party takes power and introduces public country-by-country reporting (CbCR).

EU and US businesses are investing more in Dutch operations owing to slowing business growth conditions from a US-China tradewar, Brexit, and unilateral digital service taxes.

Brookings Papers, ByEmmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman

The paper discusses the progressive taxation of householdwealth. The paper discuss: (i)whatwealth is, how it is distributed, and how much revenue a progressivewealth tax could generate in the United States, (ii) the role awealth tax can play to increase the overall progressivity of the US tax system, (iii) the empirical evidence onwealth tax avoidance and evasion aswell as tax enforcement policies, (iv) the real economic effects ofwealth taxation on inequality, the capital stock, and economic activity, and (v) present a simple tractable model of the taxation of billionaires'wealth that can be applied to the Forbes list of the 400 richest Americans since 1982. The model applied to the Forbes data illustrates the long-run effects ofwealth taxation on topfortunes.

By Jan Stojaspal

The Czech Republic refined its draft proposal for a 7% tax on global tech companies to exclude smaller market players.

By Karlis Salna

Indonesia's plan to cut corporate taxes received cautious support from economists and credit rating analysts.

By Hamza Ali

Australia's tax authority has proposed that the country's 10% goods and services tax apply to digital services, such as online advertising.

By Siri Bulusu

The Indian government signed 26 advance pricing agreements (APAs) in the first quarter of the 2019 financial year, according to a government release.

By James Munson

Alberta's drive to become the lowest-taxed region for corporations in Canada may not bring the aimed-for economic revival, skeptical economists say.

By Sony Kassam

Tax authoritieswant their slice of the billions of dollars of untaxed revenue flowing through platforms like Amazon.com Inc. and Netflix Inc. Their plan: To enlist banks, credit card companies and mobile payment providers to help them collect it.

By Sony Kassam

France, India, and China must ensure that multinational companies not headquartered in those countries file global tax reportswith tax administrations there onlywhen OECD guidelines call for it, the organization said.

By James Regan (Bloomberg) and Isabel Gottlieb (Bloomberg Tax)

French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire had "very constructive discussion"with U.S. counterpart Steven Mnuchin about digital tax, he said on Twitter.

By Emily L. Foster

Proposed regulations clarifying the exceptions from tax on the sales by foreign pension funds that invest in U.S. real estate require several changes, according to the New York State Bar Association Tax Section.

By Ryan Finley

IRS officials are aware of the possibility that antiavoidance provisions of the global intangible low-taxed income and participation exemption regulations could create double gain recognition and are looking for appropriateways to avoid that result.

By Tax Analyst

The number of jurisdictions that have implemented country-by-country reporting has increased, and nearly all large multinational enterprises are now under scrutiny under the standard, the OECD said in its latest round of peer reviews.

Swedish Finance Minister Magdalena Andersson said on Saturday the centre-left coalition governmentwould introduce a bank tax to help fund greater defence spending from 2022. The Social Democrats and Greens said on Friday they had agreedwith the Centre and Liberal Parties,which back them in parliament, to boost defence spending by 5 billion Swedish crowns ($520 million) a year from 2022 to 2025.

On August 29, 2019, German Economy Minister Peter Altmaier announced the outlines of a plan to reduce the tax and regulatory burden on small and medium-sized companies in Germany. In presenting the SME Strategy, Altmaier proposed reducing the tax burden on SMEs through a gradual phasing out of the solidarity tax, and by limiting the level of corporate tax paid by such firms to 25 percent of profits. Altmaier also called for a tax ceiling for private companies,whichwould limit their overall tax burden to 45 percent.

The United States officially entered into a tax treaty protocolwith Japan andwill enter into onewith Spain later this year, the U.S. Department of the Treasury said on Friday. The treaty protocolwith Japanwent into effect on Friday, and the onewith Spain is set to enter into effect on Nov. 27, the agency said in a statement.

The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Developmentis reviewing the Bulgarian tax authority's security measures following a massive data breach that included taxpayer information exchangedwith other countries through a global reporting system, the organization confirmed Friday. The July 15 breach,which according to news reports affected seven million Bulgarian taxpayers, is the first to involve the common reporting standard, a global initiative spearheaded by the OECD to exchange data about taxpayers in the hope of stemming illegal tax evasion.

By Raymond Colitt

Taxing thewealthy is becoming the latest sign of how Chancellor Angela Merkel's already-frail coalition is drifting apart, adding to the political turbulence as the economy teeters on the brink of recession.

By Isabel Gottlieb

A new French-U.S. digital tax deal did little to allay concerns that U.S. tech giants aren't ready to make their first tax payment in November.

By Aaron Junge, Karl Edward Russo and Peter R. Merrill

In this article, the authors examine the legal and economic issues surrounding a foreign minimum tax, setting out the consequences and administrative details of various design options.

By Elodie Lamer

With the aim of reviewing the energy taxation directive by the end of 2020, the European Commission's Directorate-General for Taxation and Customs Union is considering proposing qualified majority voting in tax matters.

By Amanda Athanasiou

Digital taxes and tradewars are potential factors in lackluster mergers and acquisitions activity across Europe in the first half of 2019, according to newly released data.

By Jad Chamseddine

The Tax Cuts and Jobs Actwas intended to be a comprehensive overhaul of the U.S. tax system, but a key piece coveted by multinationalswas left out and remains in flux as Congress mulls its future.

A global attempt by more than 120 countries to find away to more fairly tax global internet giants is moving ahead despite individual countries' deciding to impose their own tax, says the head of the international organization leading the project. Angel Gurria, secretary general of the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, said Sunday at the Group of Seven summit in France that "whatwe are seeing is a very strong and a very clear signal ofwanting to find a multilateral solution."

Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang's new climate plan places stock in private sector investment and nuclear power to meet its emissions-cutting goals. According to a plan rolled out Monday morning, Yangwould invest billions in the private sector if elected to create technologies needed to curb carbon emissions, such as the creation of new nuclear facilities, and build electric grid resilience to achieve his goal of a "fully green" economy by 2049. Yang's proposal also calls for the establishment of a carbon tax, a concept few other presidential contenders have outright proposed.

French President Emmanuel Macron said Monday that his country and the U.S. have reached a "very good agreement" on France's digital tax. Macron said at a joint press conferencewith President Trump following the Group of Seven summit in France thatwhen an international tax on digital services is established, Francewill get rid of its national tax and companies that have paid France's digital tax "will be reimbursed."

By Tax Analyst

With Canada's federal election scheduled to take place on or before October 21, Conservative Party members arewarning that carbon taxeswill go up if the Liberal government is reelected ÔøΩ a claim the Liberals refute.

By Allison Christians

Allison Christians considers the late economist Peggy Musgrave and herwork's lasting influence on modern-day tax and public finance policy, especially regarding efforts to tax the digital economy.

By Stephanie Soong Johnston

As France cheered an agreementwith the United States to resolve tensions over its controversial digital services tax, trade groupswarned it could lead to more pain than gain for companies and tax authorities alike.

Bywilliam Hoke

A leading congressman in Mexico's governing party recently introduced legislation to amend VAT and income tax laws so that foreign companies providing digital services are considered to have a tax domicile in Mexico.

By Stephanie Soong Johnston

France intends to reimburse companies paying its digital services tax once a globally agreed approach on taxing the digital economy exists, a move that raises the stakes for ongoing negotiations, according to the OECD's tax chief.

By Ryan Finley

The Ninth Circuit's rejection of the IRS's valuation method in Amazon under old law may not affect new cost-sharing disputes, but its observation on later revisions raises other questions regarding the transfer pricing regulations.

By Alexander Kell

German Finance Minister Olaf Scholz backs the push by his Social Democratic party to reinstate awealth tax, according to an interviewwith Handelsblatt.

By Stephanie Bodoni

European Union judgeswill rule next month on appeals by Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV and Starbucks Corp. against decisions ordering them to pay allegedly illegal tax subsidies.

By Hugo Miller and Stephanie Bodoni

In Prime Minister Boris Johnson's post-Brexit vision of a dynamic economy unshackled from the European Union, depressed British port citieswill come roaring back to life as tax-exempt free ports. A concrete bunker on the edge of Luxembourg's airport provides a useful reality check.

By Viriya Singgih and Tassia Sipahutar

Indonesia expects a reduction in income tax on gains made from securities backed by projects and property to help finance part of the billions of dollars it needs to build new airports, roads and railways.

By Siddhartha Singh and Siri Bulusu

India may soon roll back an additional levy on foreign funds and announce other measures to boost economic growth, a government official said in comments that helped the stock and currency markets reverse losses.

By Carrie Brandon Elliot

Carrie Elliot describes how new proposed regs allow taxpayers to elect an exclusion from global intangible low-taxed income for controlled foreign corporation's high-taxed income.

By Rogerio Abdala Bittencourt Jr. and Antonio José Ferreira Levenhagen

In this article, the authors discuss how Brazil can align its tax ruleswith international standards in the areas of fiscal and financial secrecy, tax evasion, avoidance, and aggressive tax planning in preparation for accession to the OECD.