Corporate Tax Base in the Light of the IAS/IFRS and EU Directive 2013/34: A Comparative Approach


Book Description

The recent relaunch of the European Commission’s Common Consolidated Corporate Tax Base (CCCTB) project promises a sorely needed leap forward in the harmonization of the rules by which companies calculate their taxable profits. In particular, the initiative hopes to remedy the severe barrier to cross-border business caused by the ‘the accounting Tower of Babel’ by which companies’ tax bases are determined under national law. This thorough analysis and commentary covers the influence of accounting rules on tax, considering both generally accepted standards – international accounting standards (IAS) and international financial reporting standards (IFRS) – and EU Directive 2013/34. Three introductory chapters usher in detailed comparative overviews of the effect of these rules on taxation in nine EU Member States as well as in two other major EU trading partners, the United States and Brazil. Fully explaining the remarkable recent improvement in the comparability of accounts that represent favourable preconditions for creating a single market for financial services within the EU, this book covers every relevant detail, including the following and much more: – criterion of evaluation of alternative fixed assets based on revaluated amounts; – criterion based on fair value; – provisions applicable to income statements, notes, reports, and financial statements; – rules applicable to the publication of documents; – transparency in payments to governments; – dispositions on exemptions; – hierarchy of general provisions and principles; – balance sheet and profit and loss account; – simplifications for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs); – system of creditors’ protection; and – protection of investors’ interests. This book is a peerless explication of the taxation choices granted to Member States under IAS/IFRS and EU Directive 2013/34 and how they will be affected by ongoing Commission initiatives. Because relevant, timely, reliable, and comparable information assumes a leading role in protecting the interests of investors, creditors, and other stakeholders, as well as in ensuring that all operators act on a level playing field under equal conditions, the analysis presented here is of immeasurable value to lawyers, business persons, and officials concerned with taxation, not only in Europe but anywhere within the reach of international trade.




Corporate Taxation, Group Debt Funding and Base Erosion


Book Description

The EU’s Anti-Tax Avoidance Directive (ATAD), implemented in January 2019, confronts Member States with complex challenges, particularly via the introduction of an interest limitation rule. This timely book, the first in-depth analysis of the features and implications of the directive, provides insightful and practical discussions by experts from around Europe on the crucial interactions of the ATAD with other existing anti-tax avoidance measures, the European financial sector and the fundamental freedoms. Specific issues and topics covered include the following: relation with the OECD’s Base Erosion and Profit Sharing project (BEPS) and the EU’s Common Corporate Tax Base initiative; technical subjects relating to corporate taxation and debt funding; problems caused by the diametrically opposite tax treatment of debt and equity within a group of companies; exclusion clauses for interest expenses; and interplay between interest limitation rules and anti-hybrid rules. A comparative analysis of implementation issues in four leading Member States—Germany, Italy, Spain and The Netherlands—as well as a global general survey with regard to interest limitation rules allow readers to assess the particular complexities associated to the implementation of the ATAD. This matchless commentary by leading European tax law academics and practitioners on an important and much-debated item of EU legislation gives practitioners, enterprises and tax authorities an early opportunity to understand the practical effects of the directive in the various Member States.




Special Tax Zones and EU Law


Book Description

Economic recovery from the global financial crisis of 2007–2008 has been sketchy, with some areas within the European Union (EU) still trapped in seemingly irremediable industrial stagnation and job loss. EU institutions are called upon to provide concrete amelioration for these situations, through the design and implementation of effective tax policies in accordance with the fundamental principles of EU law. In this original, innovative book, the author presents a new and expanded view of how special tax zones (STZs) – areas of land where territorial advantages are granted on direct and/or indirect taxation – can deliver growth and mitigate economic and social emergency. Recognizing that, although a number of STZs within the EU have been established, there is still no systematic framework for them in the EU legal system, the author works out a comprehensive theory for STZs in the field of European tax law, dealing incisively with the interface of STZs with such essential legal and tax aspects as the following: customs union provisions; benefits on direct and indirect taxation; State-aid rules; free movement of persons; harmful tax competition; and role of EU social cohesion policies and their implementation. Furthermore, the author develops a new model of STZs for the most disadvantaged areas of the EU – the so-called Social Cohesion Zone – to respond decisively to issues of compatibility with such critical variables of EU law as those dealing with the outer limits set by State-aid rules and fundamental freedoms, clearly demonstrating the model’s practical viability. Detailed reviews of Member States’ practice in existing STZs and their tax regimes are thoroughly described so different variables can be compared. As a comprehensive description of the state of knowledge about STZs, including the relevant background and their current place in EU law, this book has no precedents and no peers. It allows practitioners, policymakers, and academics in tax law to fully understand the relationship between EU law, national legislation, and STZs, focusing on the possibility of reconciling the tax sovereignty of Member States with a supporting and coordinating role of the EU institutions. It will be warmly welcomed by the tax law community.




Co-operative Compliance and the OECD’s International Compliance Assurance Programme


Book Description

Prominent among initiatives addressing the urgent need for a common understanding between multinational enterprises (MNEs) and national tax authorities about risks and risk assessment is the International Compliance Assurance Programme (ICAP), which provides a channel for MNEs to engage in simultaneous discussions with multiple national tax administrations, thus enhancing the potential for advance tax assurance. To a certain extent, the ICAP represents the internationalization of Co-operative Compliance frameworks which were, until then, restricted within the borders of single jurisdictions. This book is the first to investigate Co-operative Compliance alongside with the ICAP, describing developments in twelve countries (Australia, Austria, Canada, Germany, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States). Following a general introduction, two opening perspectives on the ICAP are presented, one from the OECD and one from a participating tax administration (the Netherlands), leading to the twelve country reports and a special chapter on transfer pricing, which is the main issue in international tax disputes. Specific elements reviewed include the following: criteria to enter the programme; the range of taxes covered by the programme; real-time consultation procedures; appeal procedures within the programme; the possibility to ‘agree to disagree’ and to continue Co-operative Compliance even in cases of litigation; risk management strategies within tax authorities; corporate administrative compliance burden; and main sources of tax uncertainty. Country reports are contributed by tax professionals and tax academics experienced in dealing with Co-operative Compliance and the ICAP. Each report addresses the same questions, so that all the reports cover the same features of domestic relationship approaches and the ICAP. A final chapter reviews the collected contributions and offers some concluding remarks. Although the ICAP process probably will undergo further adjustments, it is certain that the road to more international cooperation between tax authorities and MNEs is now open. This timely book, as a comparative review of the implementation of the ICAP among leading jurisdictions active in global trade, provides matchless insights into trends, similarities, differences and their implications. It will be welcomed by all stakeholders in the international tax community, including lawyers, taxation authorities and academics.




European Company Law


Book Description

The book provides students of European company law courses, scholars and practitioners with an overview. Although company law remains mainly regulated at the level of national laws, it has become important to obtain a systematic view of the main directives in the field of company law, the EU Court of Justice’s jurisprudence, the European Model Company Act and the state of implementation of these directives in the member states of the Union. The book therefore contains, in addition to the illustration of the law laid down by EU legislative bodies and the related soft laws, detailed references to the most important domestic legislations and case laws, in order to make them known and usable as much as possible. Moreover, the book allows identifying the most relevant current legislative trends and the main historical reasons for divergences.




Cooperative Compliance


Book Description

National taxation authorities around the world are rapidly improving international cooperation, given the unprecedented triple impact of persistent revelations of large-scale corporate tax avoidance, the ever-increasing intricacies of digital cross-border transactions, and the unprecedented revenue deficits engendered by the COVID-19 pandemic. There is also a growing recognition that improving tax compliance needs to be reconciled with a legitimate desire on the part of businesses to have some certainty about their taxes. Cooperative compliance is one way to achieve that. This first analysis of the details of cooperative compliance programmes currently in operation describes tax control frameworks, suggests practical examples to assist practitioners in tax administrations and the private sector, and provides multiple perspectives on the design and legitimacy of such programmes. Drawing on detailed information contributed by tax practitioners and academics from a wide range of jurisdictions worldwide, the book identifies and explains certain crucial elements of successful programmes: the criteria for access to cooperative compliance (e.g., is the programme voluntary or mandatory? Is there a financial threshold? Will the criteria be publicly available?); model legislation that can facilitate the operation of such programmes (statutory provisions, administrative rules and procedures, etc.); the foundations for an international agreement on an audit assurance standard for tax control frameworks (including the role of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the European Union (EU), and other international organizations); how to develop a methodology to measure the cost and benefits of cooperative compliance programmes; detailed case studies of existing compliance programmes in Australia, Austria, China, Germany, Italy, Poland, and Russia; and how to communicate a cooperative compliance programme to obtain trust from society. The analysis draws on two years of work led by WU Global Tax Policy Center (GTPC) at Vienna University of Economics and Business in cooperation with the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) and the Commonwealth Association of Tax Administrators (CATA). The project brought together over two hundred people from 25 countries, including public officials, businesses, and academics. Tax certainty and predictability are key components for providing a tax environment that is conducive to cross-border trade and investment, and, in the long term, it is in the interest of both governments and businesses to minimize tax uncertainty as much as possible. This truly helpful book promises to pave the way to an internationally effective tax framework that will be welcomed by taxation authorities and practitioners worldwide.




Insurance in European VAT


Book Description

Insurance constitutes a significant part of the financial services sector and is one of the foundations of modern economy and society. In the design of tax laws, however, whether and how to tax insurance is a complex issue that has become particularly controversial in the area of value-added tax (VAT). In the European Union, as in most of the world, insurance is exempt from VAT, but New Zealand and Australia do not follow this practice. Given that New Zealand’s simple, comprehensive goods and services tax (GST) – called ‘the world’s purest value-added tax’ – and its modified Australian version do not appear to suffer from the shortcomings in efficiency and effectiveness that plague European VAT, a comparison of the two systems is in order. This book is not only the first comparative in-depth study of the treatment of insurance in the two systems, but also the first comprehensive legal research devoted to the treatment of insurance in EU VAT published in English. Among the underlying issues and topics treated by the two systems covered are the following: – who has a right to deduct input VAT in relation to supplies inherent in insurance arrangements and to what extent; – what constitutes a supply of insurance and consideration for such a supply; – what transactions fall within the scope of the VAT Directive’s exemption for insurance; and – drawing a line between insurance and saving. The analysis is grounded in a methodology in which concepts of European VAT are compared with concepts performing the same function in the Australian and New Zealand GST laws. The author concludes with proposals for reform in EU VAT in the light of experience in these two major non-EU countries. Given that it has been proven that exemptions from VAT (such as insurance) cause a significant number of economic distortions and inefficiencies, this study represents a major contribution to a topical debate in European VAT law. It will be welcomed by taxation authorities, interested policymakers, practitioners, and scholars not only in Europe but worldwide.




Towards a Neutral Formulary Apportionment System in Regional Integration


Book Description

International tax regimes and practices are heavily criticized for failing to fairly levy corporate tax on giant multinational taxpayers in the current globalized and digitalized world. This important and far-seeing book demonstrates how formulary apportionment (FA) – an approach by which a multinational corporation pays each jurisdiction’s corporate tax based on the share of its worldwide income allocated to that jurisdiction – can achieve the much-sought goal of aligning value creation and taxation. The author, through an intensive analysis of the European Union’s (EU’s) Common Consolidated Corporate Tax Base (CCCTB) Directive Proposal(s) and comparison to the United States (US’s) formulary apportionment experience, shows how the perceived problems with an FA system can be overcome and lays out the necessary elements for its feasibility. With detailed attention to the debates around formulary apportionment and its theoretical foundations, the book provides a blueprint for rebuilding the normative framework for the EU’s tax reform by clearly analysing the implications of the following and more: theorising public benefits to be represented by taxation; reorganising different economic theories about tax neutrality and tax justice; advancing the comparative legal research methodology to analyse law reform by combining the functional approach and the problem-solving approach; designing the logical formulary apportionment system for digital economy; ensuring the removal of the incentive for multinationals to shift reported income to low-tax locations; reducing the tax system’s complexity and the administrative burden it imposes on firms; eliminating transfer pricing complexity for intra-firm transactions; achieving equal weighting of the sales factor, the labour factor, and the asset factor in the formula; application of ‘destination-based’ rule for attributing the sales factor; and replacing the traditional permanent establishment nexus with a ‘factor presence nexus’. The presentation incorporates extensive comparison between the EU’s formulary apportionment tax reform option and FA systems existing in the United States (US) at state level, including reference to relevant US case law and legislation. As a possible option to address the problem of base erosion and profit shifting (BEPS), formulary apportionment is gaining increasing acceptance and attention. This book will prove invaluable to taxation authorities, tax practitioners, and scholars in its deeply informed and systematic guidance on good practices and prevention of problematic experiences in establishing and implementing an effective and market-neutral FA system.




Book-Tax conformity in the IFRS Era


Book Description

368.24




Corporate Tax Base in the Light of the IAS/IFRS and EU Directive 2013/34


Book Description

EUCOTAX Series on European Taxation Volume 48 Corporate Tax Base in the Light of the IAS / IFRS and EU Directive 2013/34: A Comparative Approach aims to address how companies' tax bases will be determined under national law. The recent relaunch of the European Commission's Common Consolidated Corporate Tax Base (CCCTB) project promises a sorely needed leap forward in the harmonization of the rules by which companies calculate their taxable profits - in particular, the initiative hopes to remedy the severe barrier to cross-border business caused by the 'accounting Tower of Babel' by which companies' tax bases are determined under national law. This thorough analysis and commentary covers the influence of accounting rules on tax, considering both generally accepted standards - international accounting standards (IAS) and international financial reporting standards (IFRS) - and EU Directive 2013/34. Three introductory chapters usher in detailed comparative overviews of the effect of these rules on taxation in nine EU Member States as well as in two other major EU trading partners, the United States and Brazil. What's in this book: Fully explaining the remarkable recent improvement in the comparability of accounts that represent favorable preconditions for creating a single market for financial services within the EU, this book covers every relevant detail, including the following and much more: criterion of evaluation of alternative fixed assets based on revaluated amounts; criterion based on fair value; provisions applicable to income statements, notes, reports, and financial statements; rules applicable to the publication of documents; transparency in payments to governments; dispositions on exemptions; hierarchy of general provisions and principles; balance sheet and profit and loss account; simplifications for small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs); system of creditors' protection; and protection of investors' interests. This book offers a comparative study of how accounting rules affect tax law in eleven major jurisdictions and provides an in-depth comparison of accounting and taxation from legislative, regulatory, and commercial perspectives. Different models of tax base determination are discussed and compared. How this will help you: The book is a peerless explication of the taxation choices granted to Member States under IAS/IFRS and EU Directive 2013/34 and how they will be affected by ongoing Commission initiatives. Since relevant, timely, reliable, and comparable information assumes a leading role in protecting the interests of investors, creditors, and other stakeholders, as well as in ensuring that all operators act on a level playing field under equal conditions, the analysis presented is of immeasurable value to lawyers, business persons, and officials concerned with taxation, in Europe and other states where international trade is being practiced.