Brasil de Fato: Telecoms companies Vivo, Claro and Tim ‘accentuate Brazilian tax injustice’

Brasil de Fato reports on recent CICTAR report looking in telecoms giants

Brazilian media outlet, Brasil de Fato, reports on CICTAR’s new report looking into the way that three major telecoms companies are finding ways to reduce their tax bills while accumulating billions of $Rs in unpaid debt.

CICTAR researcher Livi Gerbase is quoted, saying that “in Brazil, there is a culture of non-payment of this active debt, especially among large multinational companies…

According to our analysis, the issue of active debt was still a loophole that we have to work to overcome, because it is a cause of fiscal injustice in Brazil”

The report is also covered in the independent news outlet ICL Noticias, here

The study was launched on Tuesday 26th May and was supported by the Union of Fiscal Auditors of the State Revenue of São Paulo (Sinafresp) and the Inter-Union Department of Statistics and Socioeconomic Studies (Dieese).

The report points to a very low tax payment by the telecom companies. ‘The projection is that they should be paying 34%, which is the sum of the 24% related to Income Tax (IR) and the 9% Social Contribution on Net Income (CSLL). The official effective rates between 2020 and 2024 were, on average, 7.92 percent of Tim and 11.90% of Vivo’.

The report provides a number of recommendations to end the ‘culture of non-payment’

The newspaper contact the companies, and authorities for comment.

Vivo said in a statement that it “maintains its fiscal regularity and that it has discussions with the state tax authorities in the administrative and judicial spheres, as provided for in the legislation.” The company reiterated that “tax certificates are regular and in effect.”

The Attorney General’s Office of the State of São Paulo (PGE/SP) responded to the report, but stressed that, without access to the Cictar dossier, it cannot deepen specific points of the methodology used.

The prosecutor’s office rejects the use of the term “abdication.” It states that, by the tax transaction program, instituted by state Law 17,843/2023, the installment amounts are not forgiven: if the taxpayer stops paying, the agreement is terminated, the debts return to the original amounts without discounts and the collection resumes.