受控外国企业的所得税管理

随着我国的经济发展,特别是对外投资的增长,对我国居民股东所控制的外国公司越来越成为投资人逃避国家税收的一种工具。由于目前绝大多数国家都允许纳税人延迟纳税,即只有当外国公司当年有盈余或者累积利润并且将其分配给股东时,股东才需就这一部分已实现的所得向居住国纳税;如果外国公司不进行分配而是将利润予以累积,那么对于这部分已实现但尚未支付的利润,股东居住国无权征税。本来,外国     

我国受控外国企业税收管理研究与完善

随着经济全球化的发展,跨国投资已成为普遍现象。由于各国间的税负存在差异,受控外国企业越来越成为投资人延迟或逃避本国税收的一种工具。本文在介绍我国现行受控外国企业税制的基础上,分析了受控外国企业的税收风险,并对完善我国受控外国企业税制、加强税收征管提出了建议。     

防止跨国公司避税之对策的比较研究(上)

跨国公司通过资本弱化和避税港进行避税已成为焦点。防止通过资本弱化进行避税的重点在于对利息扣除进行限定,或者将名义上由债权产生实际却是由股权产生的所得推定为股息加以课税,或者二者并用。多数国家实行安全港模式,对超过安全港界限的利息,不仅不允许作为费用扣除,而且将其重新归类为公司分配利润或股息,按股息的税率征收公司所得税和预提税。防止通过避税港进行避税的重点是建立受控外国公司的特别征税规则,即对实际上归属本国居民而在避税港设立的公司,对其利润归属于本国居民股东的部分,即使当年不分配,也不汇回本国,也要视同当年分配的股息与其它所得一并缴纳本国所得税,从而防止将利润往避税港转移。     

从日本一判例看CFC立法与税收协定的兼容性

为了打击国内居民企业通过在避税地设立的受控外国公司(Controlled Foreign Corpora-tion,CFC)进行避税的行为,很多国家都借鉴美国立法制定了本国的受控外国公司立法(以下简称CFC立法)。但是,在实际操作过程中,税务机关援引CFC立法的相关规定对本国居民纳税人予以征税时,却常常被纳税人抗辩,认为该征税违反了双边税     

外商投资企业在我国转移定价逆向避税的动因

我国外商投资企业普遍利用转移定价将企业利润转移出我国低税管辖区而进入本国高税管辖区,形成了我国独有的逆向避税现象.其动因在于发达国家对利润输送回国采取鼓励政策,转让定价避税需要综合考虑所得税、关税、甚至预提税,母公司所在国采取税收优惠措施,外商投资者追逐利润、追求竞争优势以及降低投资风险等目标的影响.     

新企业所得税法概念与方法影响分析

我国在2008年1月1日生效的《企业所得税法》引入了大量国际通行概念和方法,如税收居民、资本弱化、转让定价监管、成本分摊和受控外国公司等,将对企业纳税产生重要影响。     

进一步完善我国受控外国企业税制

我国受控外国企业税制的设计参考了欧美发达国家受控外国企业税制的内容,与国际通行的做法基本一致。然而,我国受控外国企业税制的规定还较为原则,虽然国家税务总局已经出台有关文件予以补充和细化,但在受控外国企业税制的适用地域和适用的纳税人、受控外国企业税制与税收协定的关系、受控外国公司归宿所得的计算等方面,仍然需要进一步完善。     

受控外国公司法律制度的比较与借鉴

国外的受控外国公司法律制度旨在避免纳税人延迟纳税的行为。而我国针对居民境外所得,尤其是避税地受控外国公司所得的税务处理办法仍是空白。借鉴国外经验,结合我国资本流出与流入存在较大差距的现实,顺应两税合并的税改趋势,有助于我国制定受控外国公司法律制度的框架体系。     

国际税收管辖权和FDI分析

传统的确定性情况下的投资分析认为,利润汇回税(Repatriation tax)对于海外子公司的投资决策是中性的,不受母公司所在国的国际税收管辖权的影响。然而,用实物期权法分析表明,当子公司考虑到投资的风险而选择最佳投资时刻时,居民税收管辖权下的海外子公司会比地域税收管辖权下的子公司更早地选择投资,利润汇回税确实影响了公司的投资决策。     

法人居民身份认定标准分类及启示

目前对于法人居民身份认定标准,相关研究并没有对其不同认定标准按比较统一的原则进行分类。现行优先标准主要对发达国家有利,发展中国家应从本国利益出发,重视日常管理和控制中心标准和受控外国公司标准,同时争取有利的协调规范顺序。     

境外股东持股对大股东利益侵占约束——基于中国上市公司的经验证据

依据2006~2011年沪深两市上市公司数据,考量不同类型的外资持股对中国上市公司大股东侵占的约束影响。结果表明,外资持股未能有效制约大股东侵占行为,不同性质的境外投资者对抑制大股东侵占的作用存在差异。QFII能够一定程度上抑制大股东对小股东利益的侵占,而银行、保险和证券公司持股均不能对上市公司大股东侵占形成有效监督和制约,不仅未减轻大股东对小股东的利益侵占,反而加重了上市公司大股东和中小股东的利益冲突。     

境外股东异质性、企业性质与公司治理效率——基于中国上市公司的实证检验

依据2014年一直有境外股东持股的沪深 A股上市公司样本数据,考量不同类型外资持股的治理效应进行实证检验。结果表明：境外股东持股能够提升公司治理效率,不同性质的境外投资者对公司治理的影响存在差异。外资基金和非金融类外资股东的治理效应是显著的,QFII未能对上市公司经营者形成有效监督和制约,外资银行、保险、证券公司反而一定程度上加重了上市公司的代理冲突。此外,外资持股在民营企业中的治理效应优于国有企业。     

Tax avoidance in family firms: Evidence from large private firms

Ownership structure plays an important role in firms’ decisions on tax avoidance. Recently, the effect of family ownership on corporate tax avoidance has become an issue of increasing interest among scholars from both the fields of family business research and tax research; however, empirical findings have so far remained ambiguous. Based on a unique sample of 678 large private firms from Germany, we show that for unlisted large firms (i) family firms avoid more tax than non-family firms, (ii) tax avoidance increases with the percentage of family ownership, and (iii) tax avoidance is a function of the number of shareholders. We interpret our results as evidence that benefits from avoiding taxes outweigh the non-tax costs in the case of large private family firms in Germany. Furthermore, as the number of family shareholders increases, family firms satisfy increasing demand for dividends by avoiding taxes.     

Corporate tax reforms and tax-motivated profit shifting: evidence from the EU

This paper examines whether the profit-shifting trend in Europe during 2003–2013 can be explained by tax policy changes. Consistent with prior literature, we find that affiliates’ profits are sensitive to tax rate changes. However, we document that tax base–broadening reforms have mitigated the incentives for both inward and outward profit shifting. In particular, we find that anti-avoidance rules prevent multinational companies from shifting profits out of their foreign affiliates, whereas other tax base–broadening rules, such as restrictions on the deductibility of tax losses or on group tax relief, reduce the incentives for multinational companies to shift profits into foreign affiliates. Furthermore, we find evidence of a downward trend in profit shifting across European countries, especially when the tax enforcement is stricter. Overall, these results suggest that broader tax bases and stricter tax enforcement have successfully curbed this particular tax strategy.     

The dark side of transfer pricing: Its role in tax avoidance and wealth retentiveness

In conventional accounting literature, ‘transfer pricing’ is portrayed as a technique for optimal allocation of costs and revenues among divisions, subsidiaries and joint ventures within a group of related entities. Such representations of transfer pricing simultaneously acknowledge and occlude how it is deeply implicated in processes of wealth retentiveness that enable companies to avoid taxes and facilitate the flight of capital. A purely technical conception of transfer pricing calculations abstracts them from the politico-economic contexts of their development and use. The context is the modern corporation in an era of globalized trade and its relationship to state tax authorities, shareholders and other possible stakeholders. Transfer pricing practices are responsive to opportunities for determining values in ways that are consequential for enhancing private gains, and thereby contributing to relative social impoverishment, by avoiding the payment of public taxes. Evidence is provided by examining some of the transfer prices practices used by corporations to avoid taxes in developing and developed economies.     

Statement of the Financial Economists Roundtable: Corporate Tax Reform

Corporate tax reform has been a controversial issue in the U.S. for several years, particularly as U.S. companies have accumulated cash in lower‐tax overseas subsidiaries, while some have used “inversions” to establish overseas corporate domiciles. Two features of U.S. corporate taxation stand out: 1. U.S. corporate income tax rates are the highest in the industrialized world. The federal rate is 35%; and, when combined with state taxes, it averages 39%, as compared to an OECD average of 24%. 2. U.S. corporations pay U.S. tax on their worldwide income, but can choose to avoid indefinitely corporate tax on foreign profits by not repatriating them. Neither feature is present in most other Western countries, where the norm is a “territorial” system that taxes companies only on their domestic profits. The Trump administration has proposed to cut U.S. corporate tax rates to 20%, thereby bringing them down to the OECD average, and to adopt a territorial tax regime like those found in most other Western nations. In this statement signed by 31 senior financial economists, the authors recommend cutting U.S. corporate tax rates, but retaining the current system of taxing the worldwide profits of U.S. companies (while giving them credit for taxes paid in overseas jurisdictions). Once U.S. rates drop to the international average, the economists point out, U.S. companies would have much less incentive under the worldwide system to use transfer pricing schemes to shift their profits to low‐tax jurisdictions than under the proposed territorial alternative. Indeed, under the current system, if the lower rates under consideration are enacted, the location of a company's business activity (including the firm's underlying intellectual property) would not affect its taxation. Along with lower corporate tax rates, the economists also recommend that Congress limit or remove the corporate option to defer the taxation of offshore profits and provide a schedule for repatriating off‐shore funds, using the inducement of the now lower rates as well as the possibility of a “tax holiday.”     

Shareholder Requirements for Compulsory Environmental Information in Annual Reports and on Websites

Growing general concern regarding the natural environment may cause shareholders to require more accountability for environmental issues from the companies in which they invest. We do a survey of shareholders in three major Anglophone countries (Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States) to determine whether they require compulsory environmental disclosure and where they would prefer companies to disclose such information. In all three countries, shareholders prefer compulsory environmental disclosure in annual reports (preferably in a separate section addressing the issue), as well as disclosure on websites, whereas separate environmental reports are less popular as a disclosure medium. Overall, legislation is preferred as a method to mandate environmental disclosure, with accounting standards more popular among American shareholders. The implication is that regulators may have to reconsider their current stance regarding corporate environmental disclosure.     

Firms’ share price reactions to The American Jobs Creation Act

The American Jobs Creation Act of 2004 permitted a one-time 85% dividend received deduction for repatriated foreign earnings. A stated purpose of this legislation was to permit companies to access foreign earnings domestically that would have been too costly previously because of repatriation taxation. Using a portfolio analysis we find that firms with large foreign asset balances experienced significantly positive returns during the legislative window for the Jobs Act, and that these findings also hold for sub-samples that are designated as financially constrained or highly leveraged. These results indicate that the market perceived passage of the Jobs Act as good news for those firms with the need, domestically, for these unrepatriated foreign earnings. We conclude that these findings are supportive of the policy intentions that formed the basis of the temporary reduction in the repatriation taxes.     

International taxation and intrafirm pricing in transnational corporate groups

Since early this century, with the introduction of direct taxes on income or profits by most developed capitalist states, tax authorities have been concerned to prevent manipulation of transfer prices between related firms, especially within transnational corporate groups (TNCs). By the 1930s most states had introduced a broad power to adjust such prices to conform with the “arm's length” criterion, since it was felt that either the application of national taxes directly to foreign parent or subsidiary companies, or taxation on a unitary or consolidated basis, would exacerbate overlapping or double taxation. However, both theory and a detailed examination of practice show that the arm's length criterion cannot in most cases be applied on the basis of “market” prices, since the raison d'être of an integrated firm is economies of scale and scope and generation of synergy profits. Microeconomic methods also can only identify these, but provide no basis for their allocation. Criteria for allocation of the costs and profits of an integrated TNC must have a political dimension: for the firm, it entails issues of strategy, and for the states, the control of oligopolistic powers over investment and allocation of the benefits of international economic integration. The tax authorities of the main OECD countries have developed close administrative co-operation through which these issues can be bargained on an ad hoc basis; but these bureaucratic and secretive methods lack the important element of legitimation. Formula apportionment based on unitary or consolidated accounts has been attacked as Utopian in the absence of a political basis for international agreement on principles or procedures. However, unitary taxation is now accepted (up to the water's edge) for U.S. state taxation, and either a unitary or consolidated basis is likely to become necessary in Europe: while formula allocation of fixed or overhead costs and a bargained division of profits has become the international practice. Still lacking are legitimating procedures and criteria.