Danish jewelry maker Pandora will pay 995 million Danish crowns ($151 million) to the Danish tax authorities, Skat, in a settlement after a transfer pricing audit for 2009 to 2014, it said on Thursday. Pandora also said its reported tax rate for 2015 is expected to be around 22 pct… – Continue reading
The Senate’s No. 2 Democrat is warning a major U.S. agriculture company to think twice about moving its legal address offshore. Minority Whip Dick Durbin (Ill.) told Monsanto that it’s in the company’s best interest to remain headquartered in the U.S., and noted that the company has had no problems… – Continue reading
The total “development finance” loss – counting both revenues and reinvested earnings – is estimated in the range of $250 to $300 billion. This prevents developing countries from stopping the outflow of money, which thus bleeds them of essential resources The financial crisis of 2008 had an interesting collateral benefit… – Continue reading
State-backed bank Lloyds has sold offshore life insurer Clerical Medical to investment manager RL360 for an undisclosed sum, Lloyds and RL360 said on Thursday. Clerical Medical’s policies were closed to new business in March 2012. The firm is estimated to have a value of 200 million pounds. “The sale reflects… – Continue reading
FinCEN announced on Monday that it is fining Ripple Labs, Inc., the creator of XRP, for selling XRP without first registering as a money services business and failing to implement and maintain adequate anti-money laundering provisions. These violations fall under the Bank Secrecy Act of 1970. In a press release… – Continue reading
UK offshore life companies and advisers both need to evolve to maximise offshore bond sales by 2020, said Axa’s Simon Willoughby. Speaking at an event in London on Wednesday, Axa Wealth’s head of proposition said pension reforms and changes to distribution channels mean the future for the UK offshore life… – Continue reading
The Senate enquiry into corporate tax avoidance has been successful in disclosing some difficult-to-find information about corporate groups as well as the Australian Taxation Office. Out of it has come news of an important detection tool developed by the tax office to identify corporate groups for investigation. The detection tool… – Continue reading
HSBC’s pre-tax profits rose 4 per cent to a better-than-expected $7.06bn (£4.66bn) in the three months ending 31 March HSBC chief executive Stuart Gulliver admitted that the company’s Swiss banking scandal has hit morale across the group even as profits beat City forecasts during the first quarter of the year…. – Continue reading
All the world’s major banks have connections between each other and work together in a secret network to help people evade taxes, whistleblower and former HSBC IT engineer Hervé Falciani said yesterday, warning that illegal offshore transactions can’t be carried out through one single bank but only with the help… – Continue reading
(Reuters) – U.S. bank JPMorgan Chase (JPM.N) has been placed under formal investigation in France as part of a probe into alleged tax evasion by senior managers at investment firm Wendel (MWDP.PA), a court official said on Wednesday. A Paris-based spokesman for JPMorgan declined to comment on the move, part… – Continue reading
UK funds invested in India could face demands for tax from which they thought they were exempt. Minimum alternate tax (MAT), a tax on the book profit of a company, has been in existence in India in its current form since 2001 and is levied at 18.5 per cent. Because… – Continue reading
In retrospect, HSBC’s decision in 1993 to abandon Hong Kong for London’s Canary Wharf was one of modern history’s worst business moves. It seemed perfectly wise at the time, just four years ahead of Hong Kong’s return to China and amid the early stages of Europe’s common currency boom. When… – Continue reading
Dropbox has become the latest technology firm to skirt local tax rates after confirming it will bill its customers from a company set up in Ireland. In an email sent to users on the weekend, Dropbox confirmed it would bill its international users using the entity Dropbox Ireland from June…. – Continue reading
HSBC says it will make its decision whether to move its headquarters out of the UK within months rather than years. It has been based in the country since 1993, when it moved here in order to take over High Street giant Midland Bank. “It’s going to take us a… – Continue reading
By Saeed Azhar SINGAPORE, May 5 (Reuters) – Singapore banks, which have enlarged their China credit exposure in recent years, were hit by a drop in billions of dollars of China trade financing deals as mainland borrowing conditions became easier while offshore interest rates grew more expensive. The premium of… – Continue reading
Cracking down on sweetheart tax deals with multinational corporations is proving more difficult than the European Commission had anticipated. Delays, uncooperative member states, and missed deadlines are among the frustrations highlighted Tuesday (5 May) by the EU’s competition chief, Margrethe Vestager. Speaking at a special committee on tax rulings at… – Continue reading
HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) is set to take two banks to the Supreme Court over using alleged tax avoidance schemes to avoid paying big tax bills on bonuses for its staff. HMRC has previously lost two court cases against UBS and Deutsche Bank over the two schemes which operated… – Continue reading
VietNamNet Bridge – Metro Cash & Carry Vietnam, the German invested retailer, which repeatedly reported losses over the last 12 years in Vietnam, has engaged in transfer pricing to evade tax, according to the General Department of Taxation (GDT). It has asked the big retailer to reduce the reported loss… – Continue reading
US fast-food giant McDonald’s could be facing a European Commission (EU) investigation into its tax affairs. EU competition commissioner Margrethe Vestager said she is looking into trade union allegations that the restaurant chain avoided paying more than €1bn (£658m; $1.1bn) in corporate taxes between 2009 and 2013. Unions claim McDonald’s… – Continue reading
BRUSSELS–The European Union won’t meet a self-imposed June deadline for deciding whether four multinational companies including Apple Inc. and Amazon.com Inc. benefited from illegal tax sweeteners, the bloc’s antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager said Tuesday. “We won’t meet the deadline we set ourselves [of] the end of the second quarter,” Ms…. – Continue reading
No investor in the world believes that India is a tax haven and the large tax demands on Cairn and FIIs have rattled investors and must be resolved quickly, said Patricia Hewitt, head of the UK India Business Council backed by the British government. With industry sentiment about the Modi… – Continue reading
A federal judge demanded to know more about HSBC Holdings Plc’s compliance with its trade sanctions and anti-money-laundering deal with the U.S. after a monitor said the bank was “too slow” to mend its ways. U.S. District Judge John Gleeson in Brooklyn, New York, ordered the government to file a… – Continue reading
Morgan Stanley veteran and former managing director Sridhar Sivaram told NDTV that the government’s decision to levy the contentious minimum alternative tax (MAT) retrospectively on foreign institutional investors (FII) for capital gains made during previous years, poses a hindrance to foreign fund flow into the country. “It’s very tough to… – Continue reading
Monsanto announced that it has resumed possible merger talks with Syngenta, a Swiss-based agricultural chemical giant. The pair explored a merger in early 2014 before deciding against it. When the 2014 talks were going on, one of the principle attractions for the deal was the possibility of Monsanto buying Syngenta… – Continue reading
MADRID (Reuters) – Herve Falciani, a former HSBC employee who leaked information on the bank’s clients and tax situation, told Spanish newspaper El Mundo he had knowledge of other cases and could act again, adding his “work was not done”. Falciani previously said that media leaks on HSBC accounts held… – Continue reading
Warren Buffett, the billionaire chairman of Berkshire Hathaway Inc., said he expects a slump in reinsurance results in the coming decade as investors enter the market. “It’s a business whose prospects have turned for the worse and there’s not much we can do about it,” Buffett said Saturday at his… – Continue reading
Bradley Birkenfeld, the former UBS employee who helped bring down Swiss banking secrecy, has explained to Swiss public television SRF why he blew the whistle on the bank’s tax evasion violations in the United States. Birkenfeld claims he was pushed into the action by the discovery of an internal document… – Continue reading
Fraud claims against Proskauer Rose stemming from a tax shelter scheme it helped sell to the heirs of the Johnson & Johnson fortune will survive a motion to dismiss, the Appellate Division, First Department, ruled Thursday. A unanimous panel, in an opinion written by Justice Angela Mazzarelli, affirmed a ruling… – Continue reading
HM Revenue & Customs is facing a possible legal challenge in the form of judicial review, over the use of a tax amnesty to exonerate hundreds of suspected tax evaders whose names appeared on documents leaked from HSBC in Geneva, reports the International Business Times. Campaign group Avaaz made clear… – Continue reading
Bradley Birkenfeld was released from federal prison in August 2012 after serving 2½ years for his role as a Swiss banker hiding millions of dollars for wealthy American clients. Five weeks later, he found himself in the kitchen of a small rental house in Raymond, New Hampshire. At that moment,… – Continue reading
Interpreting corporate tax data shouldn’t be like playing “Where’s Waldo.” Analysts seeking to understand whether big corporations are engaged in tax-avoidance hijinks should be aided, not thwarted, by the information that companies make available in their annual financial reports. A long-brewing effort to require country-by-country (CbC) reporting of corporate income… – Continue reading
The sandwiches and coffee were standard fare at HSBC’s annual meeting. But it took mere minutes for political red herrings to be added to the menu. Take the bank’s confirmation it is reviewing its headquarters’ location. Labour’s attempt to blame HSBC’s action on a Conservative-inspired EU referendum was misguided, but… – Continue reading
In the spotlight for tax practices in Australia, Apple has raised a flag about the potential cost if it is required to pay past taxes to Ireland as part of a European Commission investigation. Apple has raised a flag about the potential cost if the company is required to pay… – Continue reading
FORMER treasurer Peter Costello says changing or ending tax credits for shareholders who get dividends would see investors send their money offshore. The financial system inquiry (FSI) last year questioned the wisdom of dividend imputations, where shareholders get a tax credit for the profits a firm shares with investors via… – Continue reading
Singapore is not a tax haven, it’s a value-adding hub. That is the claim of the island nation’s Economic Development Board, the Singaporean government agency that’s been charged with attracting business and investment. It has disputed recent claims at the Senate inquiry into corporate tax avoidance that it’s being used… – Continue reading
SAN FRANCISCO, April 30 — Apple Inc. has raised a flag about the potential cost if the company is required to pay past taxes to Ireland as part of a European Commission investigation that started last year. While Apple hasn’t been able to estimate the amount, it could be “material,”… – Continue reading
France’s minister for digital affairs says abolition of ‘double Irish’ was a welcome move Multinational companies, particularly those in the digital sector, will need to pay tax where they create value in a new digital single market for Europe, France’s minister for digital affairs has said. Speaking to The Irish… – Continue reading
Gulf state intends to set itself up as a new hub for wealth management as finance chief declares Switzerland’s old model to be ‘dead’, reports the Irish Times. Abu Dhabi intends to set itself up as a new hub for wealth management, with the head of its nascent international financial… – Continue reading
ZURICH: Switzerland’s money laundering office received a record number of suspicious activity reports last year, in part due to increased vigilance from Swiss banks. The Alpine nation has faced intense international pressure over bank secrecy, tax evasion and money laundering, most recently highlighted by allegations that the Swiss arm of… – Continue reading
Hong Kong (HKSAR) – Following is a question by the Hon Frederick Fung and a written reply by the Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury, Professor K C Chan, in the Legislative Council today (April 29): Question: It has been reported that an investigation conducted jointly by an international… – Continue reading
If Illinois small business owners were to collectively offset state and federal revenues lost annually due to corporations using offshore tax havens, they would each have to pay $4,570 in additional taxes a year. That what-if scenario is laid out in a recent report from the Illinois Public Interest Research… – Continue reading
Although you may be working in China, does the ATO still consider you an Australian resident? It’s just one of the things you need to get absolutely right. The tax requirements for Aussies working overseas vary from region to region. Aussies working in Hong Kong will find last month’s tax… – Continue reading
With the Delhi High Court to resume hearing on Wednesday on the Rs.20.495 crore tax case slapped on Cairn India, experts voiced the apprehensions of foreign investors about an adversarial tax regime. “Foreign investors expect stability and clarity in tax policy, which has been coming from the top with the… – Continue reading
India’s rupee rose for a second day as the dollar weakened and global funds resumed purchases of local bonds after the government sought to clear uncertainties over a retrospective tax on capital gains. Overseas funds bought a net $130 million of local-currency notes on April 24, the latest figures show,… – Continue reading
According to the most recent estimates, the quantity of goods carried by containers has risen from around 100 million metric tons in 1980 to about 1.5 billion metric tons in 2012. Out of these numbers, one container in every 11 that is engaged in global trade is either bound for… – Continue reading
Last September, the US Treasury Department announced new tax rules designed to crack down on the rising trend of “tax-inversion” deals in the pharmaceutical industry, as an increasing number of US firms had begun to pursue overseas acquisitions in attempts to relocate their legal addresses to non-US based headquarters to… – Continue reading
Can you trust a company to run a clean and profitable coal mine when its financial controller has a case of the vagues? If the testimony of Adani executives in the witness box in the past few days is any indication, the prospects for Australia’s biggest coal project are not… – Continue reading
LONDON (Reuters) – HSBC shares have rallied after the bank said it was reviewing whether to move its headquarters out of Britain and potentially back to its former home in Hong Kong. The following are some of the regulatory issues raised if Europe’s biggest bank were to relocate to Hong… – Continue reading
BHP Billiton is contesting A$522 million (S$544.8 million) in Australian tax bills on its Singapore marketing operations up to 2010, after having paid almost no tax in Singapore since 2006, the global miner told an Australian Senate panel, reports the Business Times. The figures were released on Monday by a… – Continue reading
The Vietnamese unit of motor maker Honda and the Ministry of Finance still fail to reach an agreement on a preferential tax treatment the company is supposed to enjoy, thanks to which it refuses to pay nearly US$10 million in tax arrears. Honda Vietnam Co. Ltd. has been asked to… – Continue reading
