On December 30th of last year, the Indian Income Tax Appellate Tribunal was the first “quasi judicial institution” to apply the PPT to a treaty-shopping arrangement.[1] The case concerned a dispute between a Luxembourg-based holding company, SC Lowy, and the Indian tax authorities. Facts of the case The Luxembourg holding company, SC Lowy, is owned…

In my previous blog I examined the Tax Court of Canada’s analysis of the meaning of beneficial ownership in tax treaties in Husky Energy Inc. v The King, 2023 TCC 167 in relation to stock or securities lending. This post examines the application of the General Anti-Avoidance Rule(GAAR) in Canada to the transactions. The facts…

With a judgment rendered on 16 December 2019 (case no. 2C_209/2017), the Swiss Federal Supreme Court (“FSC”) rejected several reclaims of Swiss dividend withholding taxes made by a Luxembourg resident financial institution (“Lux Bank”) and thereby denied the claimant the benefits of the double taxation treaty between Switzerland and Luxembourg on income and capital taxes…