“The way large U.S. firms are taxed in the European Union is posing major challenges for France, the country’s finance minister told CNBC Thursday,” Silvia Amaro and Karen Tso report for CNBC. “Bruno Le Maire, the recently appointed French finance minister, is at the forefront of an initiative to impose an ‘equalization tax’ for tech companies across the EU — a potential new policy that is set to disrupt the way companies operate in Europe.”
“One of the biggest proposals is to tax companies on their revenues rather than on their profits. Taxing the latter would usually culminate in a smaller number. The idea with an ‘equalization’ tax is to avoid firms taking advantage of different tax codes across the 28 European member countries, which has allowed many of them to pay little tax in some countries,” Amaro and Tso report. “Many large U.S. tech firms base their European headquarters in EU nations with favorable tax regimes, that often means they book the majority of their European profits in those countries.”
Amaro and Tso report, “Paul Gambles, managing partner at MBMG Group, told CNBC that it seems that the European Union is backing rising protectionism and thus helping its own companies against competition from U.S. firms.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: If France squeezes out some additional tax monies, we’re sure they’ll spend it oh so wisely.
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France and Germany plan tax crackdown on U.S. tech giants – August 7, 2017