双层爱尔兰夹荷兰三明治

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双层爱尔兰夹荷兰三明治(英语:Double Irish with Dutch sandwich)是自1980年代后期以来,大多数美国跨国公司使用的一种避税手法[a]。该手法由苹果公司首创。截止2010年,美国跨国公司每年通过双层爱尔兰夹荷兰三明治这一手法避税1000亿美元[b]

法律漏洞

根据爱尔兰政策,如果一家公司总部在爱尔兰以外,实际营运也在爱尔兰以外,则该公司在爱尔兰的分公司享有零税率优惠,且向公司总部汇款也无需支付税款。实际在爱尔兰运营的则需要上缴12.5%企业所得税率。另外根据荷兰税收政策,欧盟境内的公司交易,无须支付企业所得税,只需支付低廉的交易税[5][6][7][8]

避税操作

一般美国跨国公司会采用以下措施避税:

  • 第一步:在爱尔兰设立实际运营的公司A,将美国以外的收入归入A,作为A的营业收入。同时,在爱尔兰设立公司B、荷兰设立公司C;B的公司总部所在地为加勒比海某个避税天堂(如英属开曼群岛、英属百慕大)。
  • 第二步:公司将所有产品的知识产权划归为B公司所有,B再授权给C,C再授权给A;A一旦有营业收入,必须将收入作为版税支付给C,同时A支付的版税作为公司运营成本还能抵扣一定的税收,C再向B支付版税。
  • 第三步:B将收入汇入公司总部账户。

如果B直接向A授权,B会被认为实际运营在爱尔兰境内,因而美国跨国公司会选择在荷兰开设公司C。设在爱尔兰的企业A和B就像三明治的两片面包,荷兰企业C就像三明治中的夹层食物,因而这一避税手法得名双层爱尔兰夹荷兰三明治[5][6][7][8]

效果

通过三家公司的运作,美国跨国公司的海外收入税率仅为约2~3%,而如果将海外收入汇回美国,则至少要支付35%的联邦企业税率[5][6][7][8]

由于避税太多,在外部压力下,2020年1月,苹果公司GoogleFacebook等美国跨国公司逐步放弃这一避税手法[c]。各国政府计划设置全球最低企业税率以减少跨国公司避税问题。

参考

注释

  1. The Double Irish is sometimes misunderstood as being only used for EU–sourced revenues and business. For example, in 2016, Facebook recorded global revenues of $27 billion, while Facebook in Ireland paid €30 million in Irish tax on Irish revenues of €13 billion (approximately half of all global revenues).[1]Similarly, when the EU introduced the GDPR regulations in 2018, Facebook disclosed that all of its non-U.S. accounts (circa 1.9 billion, of which 1.5 billion were non-E.U), were legally based in Dublin.[2]Similarly, Google is also believed to run most of its non–U.S. sales revenue and profits through its Dublin operation.[3][4]
  2. Before the US 2017 TCJA repatriation tax, the Double Irish shielded all non–US profits of US multinationals from: (a) taxation in the end-consumer market, (b) from taxation in Ireland, and (c) from US taxation. The 2017 TCJA placed a 15.5% US tax on these untaxed profits, and they were deemed to be automatically repatriated (regardless of whether the US multinational wanted to repatriate the untaxed profits or not).
  3. It is believed that Ireland's extreme economic exposure to US corporate BEPS activity, had led Ireland to expand into more traditional tax haven–type tools, such as the Qualifying investor alternative investment fund (QIAIF) (designed to compete with the Cayman Islands SPC), and the Irish Section 110 Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) (designed to compete with the Luxembourg SPV).[9]

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