Many tax avoidance schemes are not illegal. But just because it is not illegal does not mean it is not a form of abuse, fraud or corruption. Credit: Servaas van den Bosch/IPS KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 3 2017 (IPS) – Since the 1950s, there has been a popular dance called the… – Continue reading
The 30 September 2017 is an important date for HMRC and its “relentless” clampdown on global tax evasion. First, it marks the coming into force of the landmark corporate offence of failure to prevent tax evasion under Part 3 of the Criminal Finances Act 2017. Secondly, it is the commencement… – Continue reading
The new bill is intended to stop tax havens — especially those exposed by the Panama Papers last year. Bolivian lawmakers have proposed a new bill to help fight tax evasion. The new bill, “Bill to Combat the Use of Tax Havens,” is intended to stop tax havens — especially… – Continue reading
On 29 August 2017, Greenland officially joined the Global Forum on Transparency and Exchange of Information for Tax Purposes. Greenland thereby declared its commitment to implement both the international standard of exchange of information on request and the standard on automatic exchange of financial account information. On 8 February 2017… – Continue reading
Quick Guide Part Three of The Criminal Finances Act 2017 (CFA 2017) introduces two new corporate criminal offences: The failure to prevent facilitation of UK tax evasion offences The failure to prevent facilitation of foreign tax evasion offences Both “failure to prevent” offences can be committed by a body corporate… – Continue reading
If you live in Nigeria and you have a foreign bank account; you should read this.If things go as planned, the FIRS will soon have access to information on the money and other financial investments that you have in your foreign bank account. This will happen when the Common Reporting… – Continue reading
MINSK, 26 September (BelTA) – Belarus and the UK have signed an intergovernmental convention on removing double taxation in respect to income and capital taxes and preventing tax evasion, BelTA informs. The signing ceremony took place at the Belarusian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The document was inked by Belarus’ Taxes… – Continue reading
The automatic exchange of tax information (AIE) between countries is generally seen as an effective way of cracking down on tax cheats. But what if a country uses the data to politically oppress its citizens? It’s a burning issue facing Swiss lawmakers. This week, Swiss parliament will begin a debate… – Continue reading
The French Government has warned taxpayers that they have until the end of this year to disclose undeclared assets under its tax amnesty scheme, which as been running for more than four years. The Processing of Corrective Declarations (STDR) scheme was introduced by a circular dated June 21, 2013, and… – Continue reading
Fresh tax evasion laws come into force this Saturday. New tax evasion laws coming into force this week could catch UK companies unaware and put them at risk of unlimited fines, a British law firm has warned. Blake Morgan said it fears that “many” commercial and non-profit firms alike may… – Continue reading
Securities regulator SEBI has lifted the trading ban on 14 entities which were alleged to have misused the stock market platform for money laundering and tax evasion as it did not find any “adverse evidence” against them. The Securities and Exchange Board of India order was in the case related… – Continue reading
Financial Secretary Paul Chan Mo-po said tax incentives would help Hong Kong compete with other fund management centres The government will examine the existing tax concessions applicable to the fund industry to make Hong Kong into a diversified and competitive international fund management centre against its global counterparts, said the… – Continue reading
NASSAU, The Bahamas, Friday September 22, 2017 – An International Monetary Fund (IMF) proposal for The Bahamas to implement a low rate income tax has drawn a mixture of skepticism, approval and downright rejection. Following its Article IV consultation with the Hubert Minnis administration, the Washington-based financial body urged the… – Continue reading
BHP is willing to head to court to fight the Australian Taxation Office on a more than $1 billion tax bill over its Singapore marketing hub. The world’s largest miner has continually defended its Singapore marketing hub, where it is accused of routing profits, and says it is confident of… – Continue reading
In order to tackle irregularities and unfair competition among e-commerce companies, Ankara is planning to form a special unit to track e-commerce activities and transactions in the country The Turkish government is planning to create a special unit of 200 people to track e-commerce activities in the country, Finance Minister… – Continue reading
Markets regulator Sebi has revoked trading ban imposed on 114 entities, which had come under the scanner for alleged manipulation and misuse of stock market platform for tax evasion, saying it did not find any adverse evidence against them. This comes after Sebi, earlier this month, had revoked ban on… – Continue reading
ANALYSIS: Companies are likely to receive a preliminary notice under the new diverted profits tax (DPT) regime between now and the end of 2017. They should treat the issue of a notice as potential litigation and should immediately involve their legal advisers. For many companies the time limit for the… – Continue reading
…as tax dispute escalates Vodafone Ghana has filed a motion at the High Court of Justice, Commercial Division in Accra, against the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) disputing tax assessments of GH¢160 million, according to the Writ obtained by ghanabusinessnews.com. The GRA has asked Vodafone to pay 30 per cent of… – Continue reading
Romanian prosecutors of the Anti-Organized Crime Directorate (DIICOT), the Bacau office, carried out searches in Bucharest and six counties last Friday, in a tax evasion case with a damage of over RON 9 million (EUR 1.9 million), which involves the legal representative of Lukoil Romania. The defendants allegedly built four… – Continue reading
On September 13, the US Ways and Means Oversight Subcommittee launched a hearing on improving the resolution process for taxpayer disputes and appeals with the Internal Revenue Service. The hearing is said to be the fourth in a series of attempts to reform and improve the IRS appeals process. “In… – Continue reading
Consumers’ complaints of high rates are mere perception, say officials of Commercial Taxes department If some traders and businessmen are trying to hoodwink the system by suppressing part of cash based transactions with the connivance of consumers, they will be doing so at their own peril, warns the Commercial Taxes… – Continue reading
CBDT chairman Sushil Chandra says income tax dept will soon conclude probe into financial dealings of about 100,000 individuals suspected of tax evasion New Delhi: The income tax department will conclude its investigations into the financial dealings of about 100,000 individuals suspected of tax evasion and persuade many other assessees… – Continue reading
two executives had contributed to denounce practices of bank which are worth to parent company UBS AG to be continued, ” selling bank illegal” and ” money laundering aggravated tax fraud “. The bank UBS France has been referred to criminal court for moral harassment of two whistleblowers, to origin… – Continue reading
BEIJING (Reuters) – China’s state council issued guidelines on Wednesday on improving supervision to curb money laundering, terrorism financing and tax evasion. China will step up monitoring of abnormal cross-border capital movements to crackdown on cross-border financial crimes, the state council said in a statement on its website, adding that… – Continue reading
Three major supermarkets are under investigation for tax evasion by the Fiji Revenue and Customs Services. In an exclusive interview with FBC News, Revenue and Customs chief executive, Visvanath Das says the non-compliance by any one of the three supermarkets could amount an average of fifty million dollars each. Hot… – Continue reading
ECONOMYNEXT – Sri Lanka’s new tax law has provisions that more effectively block companies from trying to dodge taxes by using techniques like transfer pricing, an expert said. The Commissioner-General of Inland Revenue (CGIR) has been given the power to re-examine sch transactions if they are seen to have been… – Continue reading
Canada’s Revenue Minister has provided an update on the progress made by the Government in addressing tax evasion and aggressive tax avoidance. The update concerns the recommendations on tackling tax avoidance and evasion made by the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance (FINA) in October 2016, and the actions… – Continue reading
The Ebonyi State Government has threatened to drag some establishments operated by the Nigerian Government in the state to court over alleged tax evasion and failure to make remittances due to the state. This was made known during the weekend by the state Commissioner for Finance and Economic Development, Dennis… – Continue reading
Dept starts prosecution against 5 people with Rs 5k cr of unaccounted wealth in British Virgin Islands. The income-tax (I-T) department has established charges against five persons with unaccounted foreign assets of Rs 5,000 crore in the British Virgin Islands (BVI), a Caribbean tax haven. Investigations are on in more… – Continue reading
While at the beginning of the year (The Indian Express, March 16, 2017) the number of requests sent by India stood at 283 cases, it has now crossed 300. And while the number of replies received from among these 13 jurisdictions stood at 165, that figure has now crossed 240…. – Continue reading
GERMANY has accused Italy, France and Spain accusing of allowing huge companies to avoid paying billions in tax and draining EU funds in the process. Berlin officials have claimed the three EU member states have been deliberately unhelpful in the battle to clampdown on tax-dodging by large companies. In an… – Continue reading
NEW DELHI (Reuters) – Directors of Indian shell companies that have not filed tax returns for at least three years have been disqualified from re-appointment or from being appointed to similar roles elsewhere, India’s finance ministry said on Wednesday. The move, part of a crackdown on illegal transactions and tax… – Continue reading
Thirty-five Canadian business organizations have written to Finance Minister Bill Morneau to ask that he scrap proposals to crack down on the use of tax planning strategies by private corporations. The business groups have together formed the Coalition for Small Business Tax Fairness to oppose the Government’s proposals. Signatories of… – Continue reading
HMRC is probing at least two Manchester United players over potential image rights tax dodging, as reported by the Daily Mail. The tax avoidance allegedly occurred under an agreement in the 2014-2015 season, where clubs could pay up to a fifth of their footballers’ total pay packages to ‘image rights’… – Continue reading
Analysis of Finance Ministry data has revealed shocking findings: a total of 22.22 lakh entities (individuals+firms), who had never filed tax returns ever, had deposited a combined amount of over Rs. 2L crore post demonetization. That’s an average of Rs. 9,00,090 for an individual/entity which legally hasn’t earned ever! Of… – Continue reading
Instead of raising state revenues, as was intended, the increased demands on self-employed professionals in terms of taxes and social security contributions have resulted in increased tax evasion, confirming the Finance Ministry’s worst fears. Data show that incomes declared earlier this year by self-employed professionals in their 2016 tax statements… – Continue reading
Prime Minister Narendra Modi had asked tax officers to use data analytical tools to proactively track and determine undeclared income and wealth and highlighted the need to strengthen data analytics and investigation wing of the tax department. gst cbdt Tax officials have been urged to “utilise data effectively” such that… – Continue reading
KARACHI: Number of annual income tax return filers increased 16 percent to more than 1.24 million till August 27 due to efforts of tax machinery and higher withholding tax rates for non-compliant taxpayers, an official document showed. The number of return filers for the tax year 2015 stood at 1.07… – Continue reading
The Zimbabwe Revenue Authority (Zimra) is making strides to increase tax evasion penalties to punish tax evaders, amid revelations the taxman is currently collecting 30% of the prospective tax revenue. Zimra board chairperson Willia Bonyongwe yesterday told delegates at the EY tax seminar that there were efforts to increase tax… – Continue reading
The government said Wednesday that it will toughen its stance against tax evasion by multinational firms by adopting a global agreement in the country’s legal system within the year. In the mid-to-long term tax policy plan announced Wednesday, the finance ministry said that it would submit bills to enact “OECD… – Continue reading
The Internal Revenue Service has signed a contract with a company called Chainalysis that offers software for analyzing and tracking bitcoin transactions. The IRS has been pushing for ways to tax bitcoin transactions. In 2014, it issued basic guidance in Notice 2014-21 stating that virtual currencies such as bitcoin should… – Continue reading
The reach of Deferred Prosecution Agreements (“DPAs“) has been broadened to include the new offences of failing to prevent the facilitation of UK or foreign tax evasion – strengthening the DPA regime yet further as a weapon in the fight against corruption. From 30 September 2017, it will be an… – Continue reading
SINGAPORE, Aug. 24 (Xinhua) — The Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore (IRAS) publicized its annual report on Thursday, showing it collected 47 billion Singapore dollars (about 34.53 billion U.S. dollars) in tax revenue in Financial Year 2016/17, up 5 percent from the past financial year. IRAS attributes the revenue collection… – Continue reading
Four of the world’s largest companies have been under investigation by Australian tax authorities, amid new evidence from US executives about how Facebook, Google, Apple and Microsoft are shifting money to offshore tax havens. Appearing before a highly anticipated public hearing into corporate tax evasion, the executives endured questions about… – Continue reading
JOHANNESBURG — Despite question marks hanging over SARS, its chief Tom Moyane and the institution’s current ability to effectively collect taxes, the authority continues to push ahead with expanding its international net. A 31 August deadline for taxpayers to disclose their offshore assets and income to SARS is fast approaching…. – Continue reading
Revenue & Customs collected an extra £3.4billion from small and medium-sized businesses in the tax year to April 2017 after a crackdown on firms that fail to pay VAT, according to tax investigation insurance company PFP. VAT accounted for 49 per cent of the extra tax take from investigations into… – Continue reading
The United Kingdom’s Criminal Finances Act 2017 (the “Act”) creates two new corporate offences of failure to prevent facilitation of tax evasion (the “Corporate Offences”). These new Corporate Offences will be committed where a relevant body fails to prevent an associated person criminally facilitating the evasion of tax, whether the… – Continue reading
Thailand has lost income worth Bt4.311 billion due to tax evasion on luxury cars, according to an investigation of 259 luxury cars, Department of Special Investigation (DSI) deputy chief Korrawat Panprapakorn said on Friday. The DSI is forwarding information from Italy to the Customs Department to assess unpaid tax for… – Continue reading
The Internal Resources Division (IRD) has issued a directive to audit maximum 25,000 income tax files of both individuals and corporate taxpayers to detect tax evasion and concealment of actual income, officials said. The income tax authority has received the directive from the IRD not to exceed this number of… – Continue reading
The Geneva asset management firm Prime Partners has agreed to pay $5 million (CHF4.8 million) to the United States to settle charges for tax evasion and assisting US taxpayers in opening and maintaining undeclared foreign bank accounts from 2001 to 2010. A US Department of Justice (DOJ) statement external linkon… – Continue reading
