DragonI

• how much will Google bring back to America?
• how much of the repatriated money will go into jobs?

• Alphabet’s Google (GOOG, GOOGL) moved $19.2B to a Bermuda shell company in 2016 to save $3.7B in taxes, according to regulatory filings from the Netherlands.
• Why would the Netherlands report on Bermuda money? Google used two tax avoidance structures called the “Double Irish” and the “Dutch Sandwich”
• Google shifted revenue from an Irish subsidiary to a Dutch company with no employees and on to a Bermuda location owned by an Ireland-registered company.
• Google moved 7% more through this structure in 2016 than the prior year. Google’s global effective tax rate was 19.3%.
• Ireland closed the “Double Irish” portion of the structure in 2015, but companies already using it could continue until the end of 2020.
• Regulators around the world have pressured Google to pay more taxes. The recently passed U.S. tax law provides a one-time, 15.5% repatriation tax rate for companies moving cash back home.  
• Google spokesman’s statement to Bloomberg: “We pay all the taxes due and comply with the tax laws in every country we operate in around the world. We remain committed to helping grow the online ecosystem.”  
• Previously: Ireland closer to collecting Apple taxes (Nov. 21, 2017)
• Previously: France wants to make a tax deal with Google ahead of appeal(July 24, 2017)

• Google held $60.7 billion overseas at the end of 2016 on which it hadn’t yet paid U.S. income taxes or “foreign withholding taxes,” the company said in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. 

Google Lowered Taxes by $2.4 Billion Using European Subsidiaries

Google saved $2.4 billion in worldwide taxes in 2014 by shifting 10.7 billion euros ($12 billion) in international revenues to a Bermuda shell company, Alphabet Inc., the parent of the Web-search provider, regulatory filings show.

www.bloomberg.com

The amount Google moved through its Dutch subsidiary, Google Netherlands Holdings BV, and then on to Bermuda represents the bulk of its profits overseas. The amount transferred to Bermuda was 16 percent greater than the prior year, according to documents the subsidiary filed with the Dutch Chamber of Commerce on Feb. 4 and made available this week. The filing was first reported by the Dutch magazine Quote.

The revelation comes as Google faces outrage in Europe over the small amount of tax it pays in the region. Last month, after Google reached a controversial 130 million pound ($187 million) settlement with the U.K. government over an audit covering 10 years of accounts, critics called the amount "derisory." The deal spawned parliamentary hearings, a government audit and scrutiny from the European Union. France and Italy are also reportedly in discussions with Google to settle ongoing tax disputes. Outside of Europe, legislators in Australia have in recent weeks questioned whether the company is paying a fair share of tax there.

"Google complies with the tax laws in every country where we operate," the company said in an e-mailed statement.

...

Google’s Dutch subsidiary is the heart of tax structures known as a "Double Irish" and a"Dutch Sandwich" because it involves moving money from one Google subsidiary in Ireland to a Google subsidiary in the Netherlands before moving it out again to a different Irish subsidiary, physically based in Bermuda, where there is no corporate income tax.

This movement of cash enables Google parent Alphabet to keep the effective tax rate on its international income in the single digits. For 2015, Alphabet reported its average tax rate outside the U.S. was just 6.3 percent, according to a calculation using the income from foreign operations and the foreign income tax reported in its U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filings. Figures for 2015 revenue moved through Google’s Dutch subsidiary aren’t available.

...

At the end of 2015, Alphabet’s foreign subsidiaries were holding $43 billion in cash untaxed by the U.S., according to the company’s SEC filings.

• Apple pays 1.9% in taxes for revenue outside of the US. Picking on Apple because it's the newbie on the block but there are 74 multi-nationals who are tax avoiders, i.e. Google, Coca-Cola, IBM, Microsoft, Prada, Virgin, Walt Disney, Walmart. 
• .14% / 10 million people around the world control 95% of the offshore wealth - approx. $32 TRILLION. That's more than twice the US GDP for 2011
• Wealthy individuals and multi-nationals use Price Waterhouse Coopers, Deloitte, Ernst & Young, KPMG, Citi and Deutsche to setup tax havens
• marketing jargon: Neutral Tax = Tax Optimization = NO taxes
• Starbucks CFO, Troy Alstead getting grilled by British committee chairman Margaret Hodge
• Starbucks has not paid UK corporation tax in the past three years
• Amazon paid no UK corporation tax last year despite being Britain's largest online retailer
• IMF has ignored tax havens!
• Cyprus is a tax haven used by the Russian Mafia
• Accountants are the new rock stars
• Corporations are lending money from their offshore accounts to help pay for a countries debt than to bring the money back legally - being taxed at the normal rate!
• Regular citizens are paying the taxes of the tax avoiders ;)