Verdict is in, EU demands apple to pay 13 Bilion EUR (+Interest) in taxes owned to Ireland

[Carde]

See the news and explanations over here:

http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-16-2923_en.htm


Let's be honest this is hardly surprising and unlikely to be the first case of this kind. Corporate tax evasion and special agreements are being put more and more under the light and while in this case it was deemed illegal a lot of times it is done in a legitimate way. The real question is of course in my opinion how Ethical is it to dodge taxes on scales like these.

There is also the little fact that Apple made an agreement with Ireland and yet Apple gets punished and Ireland gets the cash. It also seems unlikely that apple will leave because no matter where you are in the EU you are now watched like an hawk and getting such sweat deals (with sour aftertaste) are unlikely.

Now it will be without question that they will launch an appeal, after all they are paying their lawyers anyway and 13 billion is still a decent chunk of change even for Apple.

I do wonder what the ripple effect of this will be however, seeing I work for a company that is very creative and I know a few people working for other companies which are creative. Is this going to stand on it's own or will it be the start of an avalanche for more cases? In my opinion a nation should be able to compete with other nations, I believe that governments should run more with a business mindset and this to me is part of it. However as it stands with the EU it is a giant mess of things which are and are not allowed and it seems no one really knows which what how of anything atm. Time will tell I guess.

 

[VerticalDiscussions]

O-O. Aint that enough to send man to mars and back? Or was it 20-30 billion? Ehe, its actually 8 billion and exploring the solar system, 25.

[Deli]

Link isn't working.

[You_are_a_cunt]

Seems adequate.

[Sakkura]

5 minutes ago, Deli said:

Link isn't working.

It's this page.

[ThinkWithPortals]

Great. As an Irishman, my country could really use the money

[Deli]

1 hour ago, Sakkura said:

It's this page.

Read the news from other news site. Thanks.

 

So Apple paid 1% or less of tax for 20 years. And EU is going after other big dudes like Amazon and Google.

 

US is going to retaliate, Popcorn time.

[Sakkura]

2 minutes ago, Deli said:

Read the news from other news site. Thanks.

 

So Apple paid 1% or less of tax for 20 years. And EU is going after other big dudes like Amazon and Google.

 

US is going to retaliate, Popcorn time.

What, they're going to threaten not to make that enticing trade deal with Europe, TTIP?

 

I'm sure that will be effective.

 

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/aug/30/france-demands-end-to-ttip-trade-talks-matthias-fekl

 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2016/08/28/eus-ttip-trade-deal-with-the-us-has-collapsed-says-germany/

 

[KuJoe]

Poor EU/Ireland.

[zMeul]

I love it how the source is the source is the source

[Carde]

Sorry for the bad link.

 

Ever since something fed up during my latest Cyberfox install I lost all my settings and it seemed that no script was blocking linus so that is why the link went wrong.

 

Anyhow link should work now.

[zMeul]

1 minute ago, Carde said:

Sorry for the bad link.

 

Anyhow link should work now.

[Deli]

1 hour ago, Sakkura said:

What, they're going to threaten not to make that enticing trade deal with Europe, TTIP?

 

I'm sure that will be effective.

 

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/aug/30/france-demands-end-to-ttip-trade-talks-matthias-fekl

 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2016/08/28/eus-ttip-trade-deal-with-the-us-has-collapsed-says-germany/

 

I'm waiting for the two US Presidential candidates to say something. Especially Trump.

[Uzukami]

Whats the odds of Apple jumping ship to a larger EU country?

[Notional]

As much as I hate the EU as an incompetent political union, I do love how they can own the hell out of these conglomerates. Apple is screwing over everyone left and right. There's a reason they have such insane profits after all.

Of course Apple will appeal, but I doubt anything will come of it. Microsoft tried and they were left no choice. It's not like Apple is going to pull their products from the EU anyways. They gambled, and ripped off the EU, and now it's time to pay up.

[PCBjon]

Been Irish myself so this really is good news but lets face the facts here Apple were been greedy as usual but the biggest fools here are the Irish Government for not growing a set of hangers and been more stringent with these companies on Irish soil its been going on far too long also Google is another company paying feck all tax in Ireland. 

[Anult]

For as much as I would love an extra €13 billion, everyone here knows that the government are just going to appeal the decision and make sure the money won't be paid out for a number of years.

 

That's even if they get that far, the government could collapse over this due to disagreements between party members regarding the €13 billion.

[suicidalfranco]

makes me wonder whatever happened to the small business in the UK who wanted start using the same loophole as the big boys do in order to get the government to patch those holes 

[Centurius]

3 hours ago, Carde said:

See the news and explanations over here:

http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-16-2923_en.htm


Let's be honest this is hardly surprising and unlikely to be the first case of this kind. Corporate tax evasion and special agreements are being put more and more under the light and while in this case it was deemed illegal a lot of times it is done in a legitimate way. The real question is of course in my opinion how Ethical is it to dodge taxes on scales like these.

There is also the little fact that Apple made an agreement with Ireland and yet Apple gets punished and Ireland gets the cash. It also seems unlikely that apple will leave because no matter where you are in the EU you are now watched like an hawk and getting such sweat deals (with sour aftertaste) are unlikely.

Now it will be without question that they will launch an appeal, after all they are paying their lawyers anyway and 13 billion is still a decent chunk of change even for Apple.

I do wonder what the ripple effect of this will be however, seeing I work for a company that is very creative and I know a few people working for other companies which are creative. Is this going to stand on it's own or will it be the start of an avalanche for more cases? In my opinion a nation should be able to compete with other nations, I believe that governments should run more with a business mindset and this to me is part of it. However as it stands with the EU it is a giant mess of things which are and are not allowed and it seems no one really knows which what how of anything atm. Time will tell I guess.

 

It's not the first case, and it won't be the last. 

[FakezZ]

3 hours ago, VerticalDiscussions said:

O-O. Aint that enough to send man to mars and back? Or was it 20-30 billion? Ehe, its actually 8 billion and exploring the solar system, 25.

Shhhhh spending money that could feed the whole population for days if not months on military is a muuuuch better idea believe me. 

[Carde]

1 hour ago, Uzukami said:

Whats the odds of Apple jumping ship to a larger EU country?

Small to none considering everyone is being watched and no one is allowed to make a real sweet deal. Also it is likely they already are in a few, money tends to follow rather complicated paths to avoid as much taxation on all points as they can. Why do you think so many companies have 'HQs' in my country the Netherlands.

1 hour ago, Notional said:

As much as I hate the EU as an incompetent political union, I do love how they can own the hell out of these conglomerates. Apple is screwing over everyone left and right. There's a reason they have such insane profits after all.

Of course Apple will appeal, but I doubt anything will come of it. Microsoft tried and they were left no choice. It's not like Apple is going to pull their products from the EU anyways. They gambled, and ripped off the EU, and now it's time to pay up.

Problem is these are all political moves, companies that operate outside of public view just keep on going cause no one gives a fuck. Companies like Apple and other retailers, big IT companies operate in the public eye and hence are much more interesting targets to sway public opinion.

[Notional]

Just now, Carde said:

Problem is these are all political moves, companies that operate outside of public view just keep on going cause no one gives a fuck. Companies like Apple and other retailers, big IT companies operate in the public eye and hence are much more interesting targets to sway public opinion.

Not sure about that. I think it's more of a question of the media only reporting on companies in the public eye to begin with. 

[Carde]

Just now, Notional said:

Not sure about that. I think it's more of a question of the media only reporting on companies in the public eye to begin with. 

Which is why I read a bit more once in a while when bored. 

 

It takes time and money a lot of money to do the kind of digging and investigation to find out about these deals and get to know all the ins and outs. The EU has neither unlimited time or money to do so, hence they go after the targets that earn the biggest payout and/or gain the most PR support. The EU is not all that popular at the moment so they need anything they can get.

 

Apple's case here was not even all that complicated, the structure was quite simple in setup as where the agreements, there are a lot of companies who have far more complex setups and even at times when they finally figure out how it works, they still can't figure out if it is legal or not and if not fully legal which parts are not legal?

 

It is a giant mess and it will only get worse, because believe me Apple is not just suddenly going to say "Alright you caught us we will pay everything from now." Of course not they will go and figure out new ways to deal with paying as little taxes as possible.

[Carde]

Just now, Notional said:

Not sure about that. I think it's more of a question of the media only reporting on companies in the public eye to begin with. 

Which is why I read a bit more once in a while when bored. 

 

It takes time and money a lot of money to do the kind of digging and investigation to find out about these deals and get to know all the ins and outs. The EU has neither unlimited time or money to do so, hence they go after the targets that earn the biggest payout and/or gain the most PR support. The EU is not all that popular at the moment so they need anything they can get.

 

Apple's case here was not even all that complicated, the structure was quite simple in setup as where the agreements, there are a lot of companies who have far more complex setups and even at times when they finally figure out how it works, they still can't figure out if it is legal or not and if not fully legal which parts are not legal?

 

It is a giant mess and it will only get worse, because believe me Apple is not just suddenly going to say "Alright you caught us we will pay everything from now." Of course not they will go and figure out new ways to deal with paying as little taxes as possible.

[patrick3027]

Given Apple is sitting on $216 billion in cash, I think they can miss the money.