With the declared aim of curbing cross-border tax arbitrage practiced with hybrid financial instruments, the OECD recommended, in Action 2 of the BEPS project, the adoption of anti-hybrid rules, designed to establish a link between the tax treatments applicable to the remuneration derived from financial instruments with characteristics of both equity and debt in the…
The services permanent establishment concept is perhaps the most noteworthy contribution to tax treaties provided by the UN model. The tax treaty concluded by South Africa and the United States in 1997, to replace the one terminated during the apartheid era, has provided an opportunity to consider thorny questions of services and permanent establishments. The…
China has made vast strides in environmental protection in the past decade. The Decision further indicates that “ecological civilization” a key development goal for China. Various schemes are being tried to curb harmful emissions, for example, a cap-and-trade system is already up and running in Shenzhen, Guangdong, and is slated to expand into six other…
In line with BEPS Action 12, the Brazilian President enacted, on July 21, 2015, the Provisional Measure (“MP”) no. 685, creating the obligation for taxpayers to disclose aggressive tax plannings. Even though this MP is enforceable immediately, the actual disclosure still depends on regulations to be issued in the near future. In addition, a MP…
Please contact us to assist in our research Prof. William Byrnes & Haydon Perryman In 2011, HMRC forecast that it would receive “billions” from the Swiss Disclosure Facility. In 2012, HMRC stated that this number would be five billion sterling, and another three billion sterling from the Liechtenstein Disclosure Facility (LDF). This implies that at least a couple hundred thousand United Kingdom tax…
Attacking Profit Shifting by Prof. Jeffery Kadet (Abstract) In recent years the financial press has turned increasing attention to MNCs that shift income to low taxed jurisdictions overseas in order to avoid US taxation. What’s generally missing from these discussions is any serious focus on possible IRS attacks on these companies, most of which are CFCs. There’s little…
In our previous blog we were discussing issues of non-discrimination on the basis of Nationality (article 24.1 MOCDE). Today, it is relevant to point out the fact that the idea of non-discrimination is radically different when the problem is addressed from the perspective of other International Investment Agreements (IIA’s) such as BIT’s and FTA’S. Foreign…
FFI GIIN List FATCA Monthly Update 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…
Dr. Andrew P. Morriss is Dean & Anthony G. Buzbee Dean’s Endowed Chairholder, Texas A&M University School of Law; Drew Estes is a JD/MBA Candidate, Class of 2016, University of Alabama. Excerpted from Kluwer CCH’s Global Tax Weekly Magazine Introduction Tax competition is usually portrayed as a competition over rates. Critics argue that such competition leads inevitably…
What is going on in the corporate tax world? In 2013 I predicted BEPS would be a success, at least based on the press release to be issued by OECD and G20 on January 1, 2016. I have always been a sceptic, if only because BEPS uses the wrong starting line for the project. It…
The 2010 Green Paper from the EU Commission led to significant amendments to the EU Auditor regulation (see REGULATION (EU) No 537/2014 OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL of 16 April 2014 on specific requirements regarding statutory audit of public-interest entities and repealing Commission Decision 2005/909/EC). One such amendment is a ban against…
On 17 June 2015, the Commission adopted a plan to relaunch the 3CTB (Common Consolidated Corporate Tax Base), a common system for calculating the tax base of businesses operating in the EU. Except, it did not, it announced that it would start with a modified 2CTB (Common Consolidated Corporate Tax Base) instead. ************** BEPS is…
Part 1 of the Report to G20 Development Working group (DWG) on the impact of BEPS in Low Income countries (LICs), dated July 2014, listed in its Section 6: Other High priority BEPS Issues for developing countries, paragraph c), the topic of base erosion through wasteful tax incentives designed to attract investment, labeling it as…
Due to an amendment of the EU Parent-Subsidiary Directive, the EU Member States must include a common minimum anti-abuse provision in their legislation by 31 December 2015 at the latest. The common minimum anti-abuse provision is contained in Art. 1(2) and (3) of the Parent-Subsidiary Directive (which grants exemptions on payments of dividend in the…
