Billions of dollars, none of it taxed: ATO reveals the tech giants paying zero income tax

Guardian article

The Guardian digs into the latest data from the Australia tax office.

The ATO is required by parliament to publish tax data for for all entities that generate at least $100m in Australian income.

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While noting that ‘there could be legitimate reasons’ the report names multiple major global corporations paying little or no tax in Australia including a microsoft subsidiary, Netflix, mining giant Adani and Brazilian Brazilian-owned JBS Global Meat Holdings.

The Guardian notes these are familiar patterns for sectors such as global tech, extractive industries and food.

The Guardian quotes CICTAR’s Jason Ward, explaining how many resource projects reduce their tax bills by shifting profits to lower taxing jurisdictions:

“Singapore is the key place to shift profits to, and has been for some time…While Singapore has an official 17% corporate tax rate – almost half that of Australia’s – it also boasts a system of negotiated tax breaks and discretionary incentives.

“Companies use it as a marketing hub, and you can sell your coal or LNG to your subsidiary in Singapore, and the profit of the actual raw material is booked there, not Australia,” Ward said.

CICTAR has worked in collaboration with Tax Justice Network – Australia, and researchers from the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) Business School to create a new tool that pulls together the full 10 years of corporate tax data.