OUAGADOUGOU, July 29 (Xinhua) — Burkina Faso’s Transition Parliament has questioned the country’s economy and finance minister as it opened an inquiry into tax evasion, a parliamentary source told Xinhua on Tuesday. Official sources revealed that the government had in the last five years lost approximately 40 million U.S. dollars… – Continue reading
From five-star hotels to humble tavernas, Greek tax inspectors are fixing their attention on tax evasion at summer holiday hotspots. The government served notice on Wednesday that Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras’s promised crackdown on tax evasion is now under way, a week after sweeping increases in value-added tax were imposed…. – Continue reading
Kenya collected 1.001 trillion shillings ($10 billion) in the fiscal year to end-June, a 3.86 percent increase from the previous year, the Treasury said on Wednesday. Officials in East Africa’s biggest economy are aiming at increasing tax collections to fund several infrastructure projects, including a new railway, and pay for… – Continue reading
GOMA, DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO—The Democratic Republic of Congo’s biggest-ever corruption probe was called off without an official explanation, according to both a Congolese lawmaker and a government spokesman. Investigators were looking into fraud that may have cost the government more than $3 billion. It was an investigation of alleged… – Continue reading
“People have had ample opportunity to regularise their affairs”, says HMRC as it presents the next move in its “No Safe Havens” strategy. A package of measures was proposed in the Summer Budget 2015 designed to ramp up HMRC’s powers to tackle offshore tax evasion. With civil deterrents and civil… – Continue reading
There has been much recent focus on tax structures employed by multi-national corporations. This has led to an initiative, spearheaded by the OECD, to combat “base erosion and profit shifting”, or BEPS. The shipping industry is likely to be affected both directly and indirectly by the BEPS initiative – directly,… – Continue reading
Introduction The Cyprus Government has announced a number of proposed tax incentives aimed at encouraging economic activity and attracting inward direct investment. It has also submitted a number of draft laws to the House of Representatives to implement the new provisions of the EU Parent-Subsidiary Directive, to simplify the tax… – Continue reading
Blaming foreigners for homegrown economic woes is a tradition of sorts in Washington. In recent years, the favored scapegoat has been China and its folkloric trade indiscretions. But, lately, some have taken to demonizing foreign companies for the sins of a broken U.S. corporate tax system. Given the importance of… – Continue reading
A U.S. Senate investigative subcommittee, which has used its power for more than a decade to scrutinize corporations and financial institutions for wrongdoing, is shifting its focus to keeping tabs on the government. The U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations is slated to hold its first hearing under new leadership… – Continue reading
Foreigners must not be able to buy UK homes with “plundered or laundered cash” as part a global effort to defeat corruption, David Cameron has said. Speaking in Singapore, the prime minister vowed to expose the use of “anonymous shell companies” to buy luxury UK properties – often in London…. – Continue reading
On July 28, 2015 the Dutch Government published the English text of the Agreement between the Kingdom of the Netherlands, in respect of Aruba, and the Czech Republic for the exchange of information on tax matters (hereafter: the TIEA), which was signed in the Hague on June 29, 2015. Although… – Continue reading
Why stop at $221 billion? Drug companies are entering another round of dealmaking, after plowing past the global record. Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd.’s $40.5 billion agreement Monday to purchase Allergan Plc’s generic-medicines business puts the mechanism in place to trigger more takeovers. For starters, the remaining Allergan company — with… – Continue reading
In the first 100% Conservative Budget in nearly two decades, chancellor George Osborne has introduced a raft of changes, including significant revisions to UK non-dom status. On 8 July, chancellor George Osborne delivered the first Conservative Government Budget for 19 years. Many headlines had already been flagged up in advance,… – Continue reading
None of the pharmaceutical companies that are accused of profit shifting have been taken to court, the Australian Taxation Office has said in written responses to the Senate inquiry into corporate tax avoidance. Earlier in July executives from the largest global pharmaceutical companies operating in Australia were hauled before the… – Continue reading
A litigation suit has been filed against the US federal government arguing the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) is “unconstitutional” and violates privacy rights, with implications for Australian financial institutions. The controversial FATCA tax legislation – which was introduced by the Obama Administration in 2010 – requires foreign financial… – Continue reading
A Huddersfield tycoon, accused of masterminding one of Europe’s biggest tax frauds, is expected to be extradited from the USA to Germany. Mohammad Safdar Gohir has been in a Las Vegas jail for more than a year and is now awaiting deportation to Germany following a US court’s decision. Gohir,… – Continue reading
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s (OECD’s) Parliamentary Group on Tax is meeting for the fourth time to discuss the implementation of the base erosion and profit shifting (BEPS) project. The meeting will take place in Paris on October 19, 2015. The timing has been carefully chosen to fall… – Continue reading
The July 21 edition of the Brazilian Official Gazette contained provisional measure 685 (PM 685), which creates an obligation on taxpayers to formally report to tax authorities certain transactions that result in tax benefits. The requirement is supposedly in line with the OECD’s base erosion and profit shifting (BEPS) project… – Continue reading
Billionaire offshore tax cheat Igor Olenicoff has won a big one in his long running court battle with his former Swiss bank, UBS AG, and his former UBS banker turned whistleblower, Bradley Birkenfeld. In a ruling from the bench Thursday, Orange County Superior Court Judge Kim G. Dunning shot down… – Continue reading
Tax season is daunting enough at home – let alone in a foreign country. That’s why expats David and Carrie McKeegan started Greenback, the tax company designed specifically for American expats. The Local talked to the couple about how to handle taxes in Switzerland. Taxes are complicated enough in your… – Continue reading
The Revenue Agency has confirmed that it has finalized its instructions for Italian financial institutions (FIs) to transmit their data to comply with the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) inter-governmental agreement (IGA) between Italy and the United States. FATCA, enacted by the US Congress in 2010, is intended to… – Continue reading
Globalisation has brought many benefits in terms of cross?border trade, efficiency, competition and the free movement of goods and labour. But it has also allowed multinational corporations (MNCs) much greater freedom to reconfigure the location of manufacturing, operations, sales and corporate services in ways which channel reported profits ? and… – Continue reading
Where a foreign company renders professional services to a South African company in South Africa, it is important that the foreign entity considers whether, as a result of rendering such services, the foreign company will create a permanent establishment in South Africa. The reason why this becomes important is that… – Continue reading
ISLAMABAD: Power politics within the ruling party may ruin the move to control tax evasion, as traders supported by Punjab government have backed out from the agreement they signed earlier this month that would bring them under the tax net in return of seeking major concessions. Daylong talks between representatives… – Continue reading
White-collar criminals who launder billions by buying luxury UK properties must be tackled, Prime Minister David Cameron said on Tuesday. Experts warn these fraudsters are distorting the UK property market and pushing up house prices in the process. Cameron’s criticism of money laundering formed part of a broader speech on… – Continue reading
Fraudsters behind the latest phone scam making the rounds appear to believe that Canadians pay taxes to the American Internal Revenue Service. “Notice against your name for tax fraud, for tax evasion,” the recorded message begins and continues with its threatening tone. “So before this matter goes to complaint goes… – Continue reading
Former Attorney-General Mark Pettingill describes the suggestion he had someone seeking payment of a bribe on his behalf as “ridiculous” A developer’s allegations of Government corruption over the development of the Hamilton waterfront are “farcical” and based on “hearsay, innuendo and lies”, according to Mark Pettingill, the One Bermuda Alliance… – Continue reading
On 8 June 2015, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (“OECD”) released a Country-by-Country Reporting Implementation Package developed under the OECD’s base erosion and profit shifting (“BEPS”) Action Plan 13: Re-examine Transfer Pricing Documentation. BEPS was identified as a risk to tax revenues, tax sovereignty and the tax fairness… – Continue reading
Introduction The regulatory framework in Cyprus is all-encompassing but still attractive to investment funds for varied investor requirements. An investment fund may be set up in Cyprus either as an Alternative Investment Fund (“AIF”), or as an Undertaking for Collective Investment in Transferable Securities (“UCITS”). Cyprus administers all internationally recognized… – Continue reading
This article deals with the manner in which Canada has complicated, and rendered controversial, what in most other countries is straightforward — the deductibility of business related interest expense. The reasons to write about it are threefold: the almost-concurrent issuance of the Canada Revenue Agency’s administrative views on the matter… – Continue reading
With the focus of 2014 being international tax competition, 2015 shows signs of continuing this trend. The European Commission (COM) and European Parliament (EP) are starting to debate and extensively investigate Member States’ tax ruling policies, partly as a result of the LuxLeaks revelations and partly in relation to the… – Continue reading
Financial Adviser Jonathan Lachowitz of White Lighthouse Investment Management published the following editorial regarding FATCA on the The Wall Street Journal on Tuesday July 28th: Managing personal financial issues is challenging for most people. For American expats, the normal complexities and expenses are compounded by a panoply of post-financial crisis… – Continue reading
The Republic of Cyprus has once again kept its promise to international investors and introduced on the 9th of July 2015 amendments to its tax legislation making the jurisdiction as attractive as never before. The purpose of these amendments is to clearly establish Cyprus as the leading tax jurisdiction in… – Continue reading
A litigation suit has been filed against the US federal government arguing the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) is “unconstitutional” and violates privacy rights, reports the Investor Daily. The complaint was officially filed in a federal court in Dayton, Ohio on Tuesday, and names the Treasury Department and Inland… – Continue reading
Singapore’s fight to stem illicit fund inflows has shoved private bankers into a new quandary – finding enough qualified compliance specialists to ensure the money passing through their accounts is clean. Like other wealth management centres around the world, Singapore is forcing banks to make more stringent checks on their… – Continue reading
The Supreme Court-appointed special investigative team’s (SIT’s) recommendation of stricter norms for participatory notes (P-notes), to check the flow of unaccounted money, is likely to be viewed negatively by the market. The SIT had last week suggested the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) put in place regulations to… – Continue reading
The IRS released the fourteenth FATCA GIIN list of foreign financial institutions (FFIs) that have registered with the IRS through its FATCA portal. The IRS provides these FFIs a Global Intermediary Identification Number (GIIN). The FFI may then use its unique 19 digit GIIN to complete the IRS tax self… – Continue reading
Over the past few weeks the European Union has published a list of 30 countries which have been listed as non-cooperative jurisdictions. This publication was part of a wider publication: the “Action Plan for Fair and Efficient Corporate Taxation in the EU” which also includes the Re-Launching of the CCCTB…. – Continue reading
Manama, July 27 (BNA): The cabinet has strongly condemned all forms of interference by Iranian officials in the domestic affairs of the Kingdom of Bahrain, noting that such meddling is a flagrant violation of the UN Charter and the norms of International Law. The weekly session reiterated Bahrain’s keenness on… – Continue reading
Black Money Act covers residents with undisclosed foreign assets and income and non-residents who have invested Indian-sourced income in offshore assets Compliance Scheme window open only till 30 September for declaring assets and until 31 December 2015 to pay tax at 30% and penalty at 30%. Revenue recommends disclosure of… – Continue reading
Citigroup’s headache over inquires into its Mexican subsidiaries Banamex and Banamex USA’s alleged lax compliance with U.S. federal anti-money-laundering rules just got worse. Last week, the Department of Justice expanded its money-laundering probe of Banamex, Bloomberg reported on Friday. In January, the Department of Justice issued a subpoena to Banamex,… – Continue reading
July 27: Japan’s Ministry of Finance announced the exchange of diplomatic notes concerning application of Article 7 (Business profits) under the new income tax treaty between Japan and the United Kingdom. Background Provisions of the amended Japan-UK income tax treaty (signed 17 December 2013) generally were effective 1 January 2015…. – Continue reading
With different tax laws, exemptions, double taxation treaties and free trade zones for services exports affecting outsourcing operations across Latin America, gaining a solid understanding of the distinct tax obligations in each country is imperative. In a bid to attract investment, several Latin American countries have introduced double taxation treaties,… – Continue reading
A recent decision of the Third Circuit Court of Appeals illustrates the futility of expecting that the Fifth Amendment Privilege Against Self-incrimination will shield taxpayers from production of offshore financial records. The trial court was asked to protect a U.S. taxpayer from enforcement of an IRS Summons for production of… – Continue reading
According to a recent report from National Crime Agency’s Economic Crimes Unit showed a recent spike in the receipts from a tax on homes purchased by companies, trusts or investment funds. In a report from theguardian.co.uk, this may be a clear indication that foreign criminals are using the London housing… – Continue reading
Six people, one a financial adviser, have been arrested as part of an investigation into a suspected £4 million tax evasion and money laundering fraud. Officers from HM Revenue and Customs searched six premises in Telford and Wolverhampton last week and arrested the four men and two women. During the… – Continue reading
Following the trends of countries such as Spain and Mexico, among others, Brazil has begun to amend and introduce new legislation to reflect BEPS recommendations in its internal legislation. Provisional Measure (PM) 685 was issued this month, determining a disclosure procedure as a result of BEPS Action Plan 12 (Mandatory… – Continue reading
HSBC could have to relinquish its membership of the FTSE-100 index if it moves its HQ to Hong Kong, Sky News understands. HSBC is wrestling with the potential loss of its membership of London’s blue-chip share index if it moves its headquarters back to Hong Kong after a 23-year absence…. – Continue reading
Anyone running a business online through an app store, listings site or similar services could face new scrutiny on tax as part of a government crackdown on tax evasion. Under the new terms, Airbnb, Apple, Amazon eBay and Gumtree could all be required to hand over user information to the… – Continue reading
Russian businesses are preparing to issue a blitz of foreign debt, despite financial sanctions that have all but closed the country’s access to international capital markets for the last year, according to the head of one of its leading banks, reports the Financial Times. Igor Vayn, chief executive of investment… – Continue reading
