Taipei, July 16 (CNA) Chinese yuan-denominated deposits held by banks operating in Taiwan as of the end of June hit a new high, but growth has shown signs of moderating, according to the central bank. Statistics released by the central bank on Wednesday indicate that the balance of yuan deposits… – Continue reading
DEVELOPED countries throughout the world are stepping up efforts to curb base erosion and profit shifting (BEPS), a scheme used by multinational companies to avoid paying taxes estimated as high as $200 billion globally, especially when doing business across different jurisdictions. At the 2015 Asia Pacific Tax Symposium hosted last… – Continue reading
Energy giants called to explain billions in tax havens To describe Gorgon as another super-sized resources project in Western Australia does not do justice to the scale and scope of the venture. When the taps are turned on later this year and liquefied natural gas begins to flow, Australia will… – Continue reading
New Zealand China Council chairman Sir Don McKinnon says we need to have a national debate on housing that avoids sending mixed messages to valued overseas partners. New Zealand is far from alone in having a red hot property market. Headlines in Australia, Britain and Canada paint a strikingly similar… – Continue reading
ARLINGTON, Va., July 14, 2015 /PRNewswire/ — Bloomberg BNA today announced the latest event in its Global Transfer Pricing Conference series with Baker & McKenzie, in association with the Tax Management Educational Institute, to be held September 17-18, 2015 in Shanghai, China. The conference provides an opportunity to hear from… – Continue reading
Shanghai is China’s biggest international financial centre in terms of inflows of foreign direct investment, while Beijing tops the table for outflows, The Banker reports. Shanghai is the Chinese financial centre that has attracted the largest inflows of foreign direct investment (FDI) in the country. A total of 21 projects… – Continue reading
In the midst of turmoil in the Chinese stock markets, one serious problem that may appear is increased currency outflows created by current and potential investors who would rather move their assets to foreign countries viewed as safer havens. Money laundering should be under close surveillance. Chinese involvement in money… – Continue reading
HONG KONG, July 13 (IFR) – Chinese property developers are wary about relying too heavily on onshore funding, even after regaining access to the cheaper domestic bond market. Evergrande Real Estate and Longfor Properties last week became the latest Chinese developers to cut their interest costs through the issuance of… – Continue reading
As many of our readers know, the Canadian Income Tax Act (the “Act”) provides for an unlimited exemption from the imposition of Canadian income tax on the gains resulting from a disposition of a “principal residence”. Access to the principal residence exemption can be valuable, especially in cities (e.g. Vancouver,… – Continue reading
PARIS (Reuters) – The U.S, UK and Chinese economies are showing fresh signs of weakening while activity in the euro zone as a whole is firming up, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development said on Wednesday. The OECD’s monthly leading indicator, a measure designed to flag turning points in… – Continue reading
Against a backdrop of slowing economic growth at home, Canadian companies are actively looking to expand in markets such as the United States, China and Mexico, says Simon Cooper, chief executive of global commercial banking at HSBC Bank Plc. “In Canada, from the companies I’m talking to about how they’re… – Continue reading
Lopez Valdes clarifies that only information given by state bodies The implications of the Law Enforcement Tax Accounts Abroad (FATCA for its acronym in English) adopted by the United States in March 2010, has generated unrest globally, because that nation imposes conditionalities that violate laws local. That legislation provides, among… – Continue reading
China’s securities regulator said on Friday it expects the country’s tax authorities to view favourably a landmark new mutual fund recognition scheme between Hong Kong and the mainland, reports Reuters. The plan launched on July 1 allows funds domiciled in Hong Kong and China to be sold in each others’… – Continue reading
Premier Li Keqiang has strengthened China’s cooperation with the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) after he signed two agreements with the international economic organization in Paris on Wednesday. China has also been officially made a member of the Development Centre of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development… – Continue reading
Apart from placing full time expatriate employees in China, as an investor you may often need to send staff from the parent company to China to complete temporary projects. Common examples include quality control, engineering projects, training or consultancy. However, what many foreign investors don’t know is that such visits… – Continue reading
New York State is increasingly reliant on China as a consumer of services and manufactured goods. In 2014, New York exported approximately US$4 billion to China, making it the state’s sixth largest export market. The top five exports to China are transportation equipment, waste & scrap, machinery (except electrical), primary… – Continue reading
Copycat China is notorious . Many Western companies hesitate to enter China or to bring in technology, because of valid concerns about loss of intellectual property. This concern is even greater when it comes to innovating or conducting R&D in China. But there is encouraging news: the framework for IP… – Continue reading
BEIJING, July 1 — China’s top legislature has ratified an international convention combating tax avoidance. The Multilateral Convention on Mutual Administrative Assistance in Tax Matters was submitted by the State Council, China’s cabinet, to a bimonthly meeting of the National People’s Congress Standing Committee for review. It was ratified before… – Continue reading
Chinese banks, encouraged by Premier Li Keqiang’s “going-out” strategy, are rocketing up the international bond arranging league tables in Asia, leaving investment banking stalwarts in their wake. Industrial & Commercial Bank of China Ltd., the world’s biggest lender by assets, jumped four spots from the end of last year to… – Continue reading
Chinese emigration continues to grow as the nation becomes increasingly wealthy. However, a handful of those leaving the country are wanted financial criminals, and they are heading to all corners of the world. While the United States and Canada continue to be popular destinations for corrupt Chinese on the run,… – Continue reading
June 30 — Taxpayers continue to wrestle with big questions a year after the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act opened for business. Acknowledging that the Internal Revenue Service is doing its best to implement a complex law, issues still remain as the reach of FATCA goes global, practitioners told Bloomberg… – Continue reading
The Dubai International Financial Centre spent the first 10 years of its existence looking to banks in the West. It’s planning to spend the next decade looking East, reports the Gulf Times. DIFC, as the tax-free business park is called, became the Middle East’s biggest financial centre by attracting the… – Continue reading
The “wall of Chinese capital” hitting property markets in Sydney and Melbourne will not ease up until the government introduces its anti-money laundering legislation, says an expert in ‘flight capital’. James Tee, an ethnic Chinese property developer whose business specialises in “capital expatriation” – that is, getting money out of… – Continue reading
The US Administration has put more of its hoped-for, but perhaps poltically difficult, tax reforms into the Fact Sheet that was issued after the 2015 United States-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue held in Washington on June 23-24. In the 2014 Fact Sheet, the Administration had merely stated that it was… – Continue reading
The UK’s largest bank HSBC has clung on to a place in the world’s top 10 banks, in a year which saw the global banking model under increasing threat. HSBC fell to ninth place from fifth last year with 153 billion dollars (£97 billion) of Tier 1 capital at hand,… – Continue reading
The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) and the Central Bank of the Republic of China (Central Bank) issued the amended Offshore Banking Act Enforcement Rules (“Rules”) and the new Regulations Governing Offshore Insurance Branches （”Regulations”）, respectively per letters Ref. No. Jin-Guan-Bao-Zong-Zi No. 10402567211 and Ref. No. Tai-Yang-Wai-She-Yi-Zi No. 1040021857 on 25… – Continue reading
Taiwan and China might sign an agreement on the avoidance of double taxation later this year, the Ministry of Finance said yesterday. “Technical issues” led to a breakdown in negotiations in 2009 on such a pact, which could significantly lighten the tax burdens on companies and Taiwanese doing business across… – Continue reading
Government data suggests there may be tax shenanigans going on in the city of Richmond, a situation that clearly is intolerable. Questions have been raised by a recent Vancouver Sun report by Douglas Todd about residents in the upscale neighbourhood of Thompson, located in northwest Richmond. Former Richmond mayor Greg… – Continue reading
[BEIJING] Bank of China Ltd, the Chinese lender with the most overseas assets, aims to raise US$3 billion from foreign investors on Wednesday to help finance the nation’s new Silk Road project, a person familiar with the matter said. The lender is offering notes denominated in US dollars, euros, Singapore… – Continue reading
Newcomers to the United States on temporary visas may be unpleasantly surprised at the income tax consequences. A little advance planning with tax and immigration professionals can go a long way towards mitigating income taxes due. Many countries imposes taxes on income earned in that country (i.e., a territorial tax… – Continue reading
Turnover at UK and offshore investment companies has risen rapidly, with almost one in five fund managers being replaced in the past 18 months amid growing pressure to improve performance, reports the Financial Times. Figures from the Association of Investment Companies showed that 18 per cent of funds had appointed… – Continue reading
ROME (AP) — Italian prosecutors are seeking to indict 297 people and the Bank of China in connection with a massive money-laundering investigation reported by The Associated Press earlier this month. The suspects, mostly Chinese migrants living in Italy, include four senior managers of the Chinese state bank’s branch in… – Continue reading
Wal-Mart Stores Inc. owns more than $76 billion of assets through a web of units in offshore tax havens around the world, though you wouldn’t know it from reading the giant retailer’s annual report. A new study has found Wal-Mart has at least 78 offshore subsidiaries and branches, more than… – Continue reading
The United States is through trying to needle the OECD’s base erosion and profit-shifting project with pinpricks. Last week, Robert Stack, U.S. Treasury deputy assistant secretary (international tax affairs), abandoned the subtle digs Treasury had been using to attack BEPS and flat-out said the United States is extremely disappointed in… – Continue reading
As the financial world continues its march towards a more transparent and open environment, regulations governing private wealth are under scrutiny. The traditional is changing for good while new players emerge. Once was a time, not too long ago, the words “Swiss bank” conjured up evocative imagery: secret deals; bank… – Continue reading
(Reuters) – Some large wealth managers feel the time is not ripe to start an onshore private bank in China, despite steps taken by Beijing to open up its financial services industry. Ownership restrictions and a relatively less developed capital market are impediments for Citigroup to start onshore private banking… – Continue reading
SINGAPORE, June 11 (IFR) – By selling what market sources say is the first offshore bond from a Chinese trust company, Zhongrong International Trust has opened a new funding route for the country’s shadow banks as they look to expand overseas. Zhongrong, China’s second largest trust company in asset terms,… – Continue reading
NEW DELHI — India’s goal of a friendlier tax regime for global companies to help power China-beating economic growth is hitting a manpower hurdle. Fewer than 20 officials face the complex task of working with hundreds of multinationals on pacts to avert tax rows, people familiar with the matter said,… – Continue reading
Zhongrong International Trust became the first issuer from the Chinese trust industry to venture into the offshore bond markets on Monday with a $225 million three¬year transaction. Over the past decade trust companies have become the second largest segment of China’s financial sector behind commercial banks, racking up assets of… – Continue reading
New Delhi/Mumbai: India’s goal of a friendlier tax regime for global companies to help power China-beating economic growth is hitting a manpower hurdle. Fewer than 20 officials face the complex task of working with hundreds of multinational companies (MNCs) on pacts to avert tax rows, people familiar with the matter… – Continue reading
MUNICH — Leaders of the Group of Seven nations are set to agree on the creation of a system to counter tax evasion and tax avoidance by multinational enterprises, during the G-7 summit meeting to be held in Germany on Sunday and Monday, The Yomiuri Shimbun has learned. G-7 leaders… – Continue reading
The government is likely to come out with a fresh value-added tax reform plan for the real estate, finance and consumer-oriented services industries next month, ending the three-year reform on all service industries, according to unconfirmed reports. The Ministry of Finance is believed to have already drafted the plan and… – Continue reading
Companies can face hefty expenses, and many aren’t fully familiar with their rights, says official The State Administration of Taxation will sign and update more tax treaties and step up the implementation of these agreements to help Chinese companies investing in countries that form part of the “Belt and Road… – Continue reading
CHINA’s Lenovo Group has sold four billion-yuan (S$800 million) bonds, the biggest offshore RMB (renminbi) issue in 2015 to date. The five-year benchmark deal which pays 4.95 per cent coupon is one of two biggest non-bank, corporate offshore RMB issues since the offshore RMB bond market opened in mid-2010, said… – Continue reading
Benjamin Fuchs is unfazed by being caught in the first dollar bond default of a Chinese developer. The chief investment officer of BFAM Partners (Hong Kong), a hedge-fund firm overseeing $1.2 billion of assets, said offshore debt of Chinese property developers with a single-B credit rating was “extremely cheap” and… – Continue reading
Developments in Asia over the last year have been continuous with the biggest generic development relating to the exchange of information. Asian countries have put their FATCA reporting systems in place (even though not all have yet signed an inter-governmental agreement with the US IRS), and most have now committed… – Continue reading
The present French Tax Update will focus on an overview of several noteworthy French tax court decisions issued during the past few months, in particular in relation with double tax treaty conditions to benefit from a tax credit, abuse of law challenges, increased amortization rates, and priority preliminary ruling requests… – Continue reading
Hungary’s Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Peter Szijjártó met with local political and business leaders in Singapore yesterday. Szijjártó told Hungarian news agency MTI by phone that an agreement had been reached on the transfer of Patec Automotiveʼs capacity in China to Hungary. As a first step, the Singapore-based… – Continue reading
Sluggish syndicated loan dealflow is proving to be good news for small and mid-cap privately-owned Chinese companies like Golden Eagle Group and Xinyi Solar, which are finding themselves able to enjoy pricing levels usually reserved for better known names. And so great is bank demand for assets that looser structuring… – Continue reading
Santiago de Chile, May 25 (Prensa Latina) Chile and China will sign several cooperation and trade agreements today in a ceremony at La Moneda Palace, in the presence of Chilean President Michelle Bachelet and Chinese Prime Minister Li Keqian. Li, who arrived in this capital yesterday afternoon, held a meeting… – Continue reading
