Int'l Tax News

The European Union is considering screening its own member states to assesswhether they should be included in the bloc's blacklist of tax havens.

Oxfam onwednesday rejected Singapore's defense of its low taxes after the NGO ranked thewealthy city state among the 10worst-offending countries in fuelling inequalitywith its low-tax regime.

France's push for an EU-wide digital tax targeting the likes of Apple and Google has hit another potential stumbling block after Brussels lawyers questioned the legal route used to impose a "temporary levy" on tech giants.

EU presidency holder Austria is considering creating an allowance to "mitigate a cliff-edge effect" for companies close to the 50 million euros ($57 million) threshold that is part of its digital tax proposal.

Irish-based multinational corporationswill be subject to a 12.5 percent exit rate on assets moved from Ireland starting Oct.10, Finance Minister Paschal Donohoe announced as part of the 2019-20 budget release.

ExxonMobil, the largest US oil group, is giving $1m to support a US campaign to address the threat of climate change by introducing a carbon tax,whichwould return revenues to the public in dividend payments.

Advocates of taxing fossil fuels believe their position is stronger now because of an alarming new report on climate change and a Nobel Prize awarded to by two American economists, but neither development is likely to break down political resistance to a carbon tax.

International and Dutch unions filed a complaintwith a global trade body on Tuesday accusing Chevron Corp. of funnelling billions of euros through letter box companies in the Netherlands to avoid taxation.

In a supplemental letter brief for the Ninth Circuit, the government argued that the six-year limitations period that generally applies to procedural challenges under the Administrative Procedure Act does not apply in Altera Corp.'s transfer pricing case challenging the validity of 2003 cost-sharing rules.

In this article, the authors discuss the Court of Justice of the European Union's decision in Hornbach-Baumarkt,which reassessed the compatibility of EU members' domestic transfer pricing rules and EU law.

In this article, the author discusses tax competition in Belgium and the arrival of pension funds.

Puerto Rico's governor has rejected a proposal by the Senate president to include a tax increase on the income of controlled foreign corporations in a tax reform package before the legislature.

Although more mutual agreement procedure cases are being closed than ever before, the global inventory is still on the rise,with some jurisdictions faring better than others, according to new statistics from the OECD.

The European Commission should broaden the scope of its proposed digital services taxwhile increasing the rate to 5 percent, and provide better definitions of digital activity, according to two reports from a parliamentary committee.

Tax Executives Institute Inc. has suggested several changes to proposed regulations (REG-104226-18) under section 965, including changes to provide a specified exclusion from the definition of cash position, changes to prevent double counting of earnings and profits, changes regarding the basis election, and changes regarding the treatment of overpayments.

Libin Zhang of Roberts & Holland, in his personal capacity, has offered awide range of comments on proposed transition tax regulations (REG-104226-18) and recommended revisions to 31 areas of the regs.

McDermottwill & Emery has requested clarification in proposed transition tax regulations (REG-104226-18) that stock in a corporationwill not be included in a specified foreign corporation's cash position if the stock properlywas not reported as a current asset on audited financial statements.

Davis Polk &wardwell LLP, on behalf of a client, have asked that proposed regulations (REG-104226-18) under section 965 be modified so that they take into account cash positions of a specified foreign corporation only if that corporationwas in existence on one of the earnings and profits measurement dates, asserting that the relevant requirement under the regs is an impermissible implementation of section 965.

Deere & Co., commenting on proposed regulations (REG-104226-18), has highlighted anomalies that could occur in measuring a U.S. taxpayer's cash position under section 965 for purposes of applying the transition tax, suggesting changes to exclude specified amounts from liquid assets.

The National Foreign Trade Council has offered awide range of comments on proposed transition tax regulations (REG-104226-18) and recommended many revisions in light of the complexity of the regs and their significant impact on U.S. income tax administration and compliance.

Abercrombie & Fitch has requested changes to proposed transition tax regulations (REG-104226-18) so that the anti-avoidance rule only provides for disregarding transactionswhen the taxpayer has not rebutted a presumption that the electionwas made principally to reduce a section 965 element.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and a coalition of business organizations have asked Treasury and the IRS to revise relevant section 965 guidance on the application of overpayments to allow taxpayers to choose how to apply their tax payments, asserting that Congress explicitly gave taxpayers the election to defer their tax liabilities under section 965.

Treasury should revise its position in proposed regs on section 965 and permit taxpayers to use a facts and circumstances test to analyze the liquidity of cash assets, according to the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM).

Lawyers for the EU Council cast further doubt on the European Commission's controversial digital services tax (DST), arguing that it's not an indirect tax on the legal basis onwhich itwas presented.

The proposed consolidated group global intangible low-taxed income allocation rules minimize U.S. shareholders' planning opportunities concerning their controlled foreign corporations, but issues remain.

The U.S. tax overhaulwas designed to let companies bring home their offshore earnings tax-free after a one-time payment of the transition tax, but other factors ÔøΩ including snags elsewhere in the revenue code ÔøΩ complicate the decision ofwhether to repatriate at all.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has provided comments on a range of topics under proposed transition tax regulations (REG-104226-18), addressing issues such as exclusions from cash positions, determining foreign cash positions and previously tax income, and the applicable attribution threshold.

In this article, the authors explain how to calculate the amounts needed to compute U.S. tax liability resulting from section 965 using theworksheets provided in Publication 5292, focusing on the section 965(c) deduction and the disallowed foreign credits. Draft Form 965, issued on August 30, 2018, incorporates theworksheet.

In this article, the authors examine changes in the transfer pricing environment on both an international level and in the United States specifically, including changes in the IRS's approach to transfer pricing enforcement and in the advance pricing agreement process, to determine how these shifts affect taxpayers' desire to pursue an APA in the United States.

Carbon emissions pricing is necessary to avoid some of the most catastrophic potential effects of globalwarming in a cost-effectiveway, but higher taxes likelywon't be enough on their own, a new report says.

A U.K. company acquired by GDF Suezwas taxable on gains from transferring claims on the insolvent Enron group to a Jersey subsidiary based on their market value, not their accounting value of zero.

Spain's finance minister recently told parliament that the governmentwill propose a digital services tax (DST) thatwould apply to online advertising services, brokering services, and the sale of user data collected over the internet.

Facebook UK Ltd. has defended its tax position after the company's 2017 results prompted critics to urge Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond to introduce a digital services tax, despite tax professionals' misgivings.

Ireland announced controlled foreign corporation rules and an exit tax regime targeting untaxed gains by companies that migrate or transfer assets out of Ireland, a change that took immediate effect, to the surprise of some.

Treasury hopes to release the bulk of the proposed regs relating to the international provisions of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act in 2018, and to finalize most of those regs by June 2019.

The U.S. Treasury intends to build out the architecture of international tax provisionswith proposed regulations by the end of the year and to resolve gaps and complexities in the final rules by June 2019.

Taxpayers that are required to file transfer agreements to prevent the acceleration of transition tax payments under the installment planwill not be held to the October 9 filing date.

Malaysian Finance Minister Lim Guan Eng said Tuesday the government plans to introduce new tax measures to help raise funds to pay off national debt that has snowballed due to corruption under the previous government.

Multinational companies doing dealswith Canadian subsidiaries or affiliates often look to secure advance dealswith Canada that take several years and thousands or even millions of dollars to avoid the government's intense tax audit environment.

Israeli practitioners are divided onwhether new tax regulationswill counter the dampening effect of U.S. tax reforms on American investment in Israeli high-tech startups. The Tax Authority rules provide a simpler "Green Route" for companies to restructure as the Israeli subsidiary of a foreign parentwithout triggering a tax eventÔøΩeasing businesses' development and capital-raising.

Australia is trying to shut down a gap in its tax law that allowed partnerships to fall outside of anti-avoidance rules. The loophole meant that partnerships thatwere 99 percent-owned offshore and only one percent Australian, could potentially avoid the country's multinational anti-avoidance law.

Switzerland has for the first time exchanged information on about 2 million financial accountswith foreign authorities, according to its Federal Tax Administration.

The Netherlands' coalition governmentwill "reconsider" a controversial tax break designed to attract foreign businesses to the country after Unilever scrapped a planned move from London to Rotterdam.

Austria, the European Union's presidency holder,will address fears that the proposed tax on digital companies could lead to double taxation.

Countries can no longer claim U.S.-based tech companies like Facebook Inc. don't pay enough in tax, the OECD's top tax official Pascal Saint-Amans said Oct. 5 in remarks that are a major marker in a global debate over levies on multinational companies.