The European Commission has just decided to refer Ireland to the Court of Justice for not recovering from Apple the € 13 billion of illegal state aid, which was already requested in August 2016. Things do not end there. Luxembourg is also in the process of giving Amazon the tax benefits of € 250 million that are now to be recovered.
The Apple case:
In August 2016, the European Commission concluded that the concessions granted to Apple by Ireland were illegal. The state allowed Apple to pay even less than due (remember that taxation in the country is already very low in itself) in exchange for jobs and other favors. Not all of this is illegal, but it is even more so since other companies do not receive the same treatment.
Apple has already paid the EU set amount but is currently blocked. Both Apple and Ireland wanted to await the appeal before unlocking them even though Ireland had been required to recover money by January 2017. Today, the EU has decided that it is not the case to wait further and Ireland was referred to the Court of Justice in such a way as to recover this money as soon as possible.
The Amazon case:
Luxembourg has given Amazon “tax benefits not due for 250 million euros”, an “illegal behavior because it allowed the company to pay much less taxes than others”. In practice, “three-quarters of its profits were not taxed” by a tax ruling tightened in 2003. The EU Commission writes it at the end of its October 2014 inquiry, and asks the Grand Duchy to recover aid from Amazon. Luxembourg has allowed Amazon to pay “four times less taxes than other companies” resident in the country. “It is an illegal conduct” because “multinational corporations can not give tax benefits that others do not have”.
Via | Tgcom24
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