As European Union (EU) Member States seek to counteract base erosion and profit shifting (BEPS) practices while avoiding new obstacles to the EU’s internal market such as double taxation, the credit method, also known as the foreign tax credit, is one of the essential tools in this balancing act, yet it is one that has given rise to various EU law challenges and questions. This invaluable book – the first in-depth study of the EU law constraints on designing the credit method – delineates the EU law boundaries within which the Member States must operate when they implement this method of tax relief. For the first time, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) cases that may affect, directly or indirectly, the credit method and its main components are systematically identified and analysed in order to extract the legal findings and principles that define the contours within which the Member States can manoeuvre when considering EU-compatible approaches to the credit method. To this end, among others, this book offers: an extensive study of the historical legal developments of the credit method; an overview of the key design features of the credit method, considering the optional, variable components, such as the credit limitation (maximum creditable amount), that tailor it to different legal and policy considerations; an analysis of the legal constraints on the key features of the credit method flowing from CJEU case law on the fundamental freedoms, considering the impact of landmark cases and concepts (e.g., Schumacker, neutralization); the EU law implications based on the type of credit method (direct, indirect, imputation) and the feature of the credit method (e.g., credit limitation, credit carryforward); and examples to clearly and concisely illustrate the basic operation of the credit method and some of the main calculation and EU law issues. The author’s doctoral dissertation, on which the book is based, was awarded the Wolfgang Gassner Science Prize 2020 and the European Doctoral Tax Thesis Award 2020. As a timely, comprehensive and practical study of the relationship between the credit method and EU law, this book will be welcomed by lawyers and other professionals working with taxation matters, as well as by tax policymakers and academics in the fields of international and European tax law.

This monograph seeks the optimal way to promote compatibility between systems of proprietary security rights in Europe, focusing on security rights over tangible movables and receivables. Based on comparative research, it proposes how best to tackle cross-border problems impeding trade and finance, notably uncertainty of enforceability and unexpected loss of security rights. It offers an extensive analysis of the academic literature of more recent years that has appeared in English, German, the Scandinavian languages and Finnish. The author organises the concrete means of promoting compatibility into a centralised substantive approach, a centralised conflicts-approach, a local conflicts-approach and a local substantive approach. The centralised approaches develop EU law, and the local approaches Member State laws. The substantive approaches unify or harmonise substantive law, while the conflicts approaches rely on private international law. The author proposes determining the optimal way to promote compatibility by objective-based division of labour between the four approaches. The objectives developed for that purpose are derived from the economic functions of security rights, the conditions for legal evolution and a transnational conception of justice. This book is an important contribution to the future of secured transactions law in Europe and more widely. It will be of interest to academics, policymakers and legal practitioners involved in this field.

Florian Haase presents a comprehensive overview of the general mechanisms by which taxation is withheld in Europe and explores their practical implications. He expertly navigates the complexities of international tax law and provides a rigorous examination of the challenges currently facing this area of legislation, including tax evasion and avoidance, double taxation, and tax treaties.

Series on International Taxation, Volume 82 The economic value of China’s mergers and acquisitions (M&A) market is exceeded only by that of the United States. However, China’s rapid and somewhat chaotic economic transformation has made the task of taxing M&A transactions in a consistent and prudent manner difficult, leading to a patchwork of fragmented rules that are hard to grasp not only for taxpayers but even for tax professionals and tax officials. Responding to this complex situation, this groundbreaking book explores in detail how income derived from M&A transactions is taxed in China. Using empirical studies in order to provide a first-hand understanding of the context in which the tax law operates, the book critically examines China’s income tax regime for M&A and, based upon this examination, sets out reform proposals. In six informative chapters of great practical relevance, the author thoroughly describes and explains the intersection of such aspects as the following: M&A transactions in the eyes of tax law; disparities between ordinary and special tax treatment; eligibility for special tax treatment; applying taxation principles such as neutrality and equity; continuity of interest doctrine; stock acquisition versus asset acquisition; and adjustment to tax basis. In addition to its empirical research, the analysis makes use of an examination of the rules and theories on taxing M&A in other jurisdictions such as Australia and the United States as part of its proposed blueprint for improving China’s M&A taxation. Drawing on commonly recognized taxation principles, this book definitively sets up the normative criteria for evaluating the income taxation of M&A and reveals the fundamental problems encountered by China’s current regime. Its comprehensive analysis of the Chinese income tax rules for M&A and detailed disclosure of how they are both divergent from and convergent with that of some other major economies will prove of immeasurable value to in-house counsel for multinational corporations, business enterprises with interests in China, taxation consultants, taxation academics, and taxation authorities worldwide.

The notion of ‘substance’ is proving to be central to the OECD’s base erosion and profit shifting (BEPS) project, particularly in the area of taxation of intangibles. In this book, this notoriously hard-to-define concept is examined from three distinct angles: transfer pricing (DEMPE Approach), harmful tax practices (Substantial Activity Requirement), and tax treaties (Beneficial Ownership). In a thoroughgoing investigation using the practical example of an IP company, the author provides detailed and precise answers to the following questions: What substance is necessary to be entitled to intangible-related returns? What substance is necessary to benefit from preferential IP regimes or no or only nominal tax jurisdictions? What substance is necessary to collect royalties free from withholding taxes? Given the need to agree on a common understanding of substance in international tax law in order to avoid costly tax disputes, this important book is unmatched for the clear light it sheds on the most relevant substance requirements regarding intangibles. It will prove invaluable to tax practitioners and in-house counsel who are dealing with cross-border transactions concerning intangibles.

Stakeholders in the international taxation community agree that existing dispute resolution processes are in serious need of improvement, and a global consensus must be achieved. This book offers a potential restructuring of the tax treaty dispute resolution system based on a comparative analysis of the dispute resolution mechanisms under tax treaties, as prescribed in the OECD and UN models, on the one hand, and the UN Law of the Sea Convention (LOSC) on the other. This comparative study is the first of its kind and is premised on certain key geopolitical similarities that underpin the international tax regime (ITR) and the law of the sea regime while taking into consideration the differences in the institutional context of both regimes. The author proposes a new tax treaty dispute resolution system based on the LOSC system for resolving multilateral tax disputes, focusing on the following: mapping of the institutional arrangements that make up the dispute resolution mechanisms to understand how each system works; comparative analysis of the patterns of interaction and outcomes generated across the two dispute resolution systems to identify relevant aspects of the LOSC system that may be adapted in the ITR to improve tax treaty dispute resolution; and analysis of the inclusivity levels across the decision-making structures under each system to identify specific consensus-building techniques that may facilitate the implementation of the new proposed tax treaty dispute resolution system and also enhance international cooperation across the ITR. The proposed restructuring of the tax treaty dispute resolution system expands the existing mutual agreement procedure and forms a comprehensive legal framework that aims to achieve a more effective, predictable and equitable resolution of multilateral tax disputes in the 21st-century ITR by striking a balance between countries’ right to tax sovereignty and the rule of law. Just as the design of the dispute resolution system under the LOSC paved the way for universal consensus of the Convention among almost 160 countries, the author’s new tax treaty dispute resolution system also offers a solid foundation for consensus-building towards a universal treaty in the ITR. Everyone concerned with international tax dispute resolution – whether policymaker, in-house counsel, national tax authority official, judge, tax lawyer or academic – will find the truly valuable analysis here, not elsewhere.

The topics of double non-taxation and hybrid entities have acquired particular importance in a context where transformations in the tax world have led to international commitments materialised in the OECD Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) project. In what is the first systematic in-depth analysis of the OECD BEPS Action Plan 2 and hybrid entities, this timely book provides a critical review of the approach adopted by the OECD and proposes a deeply informed alternative method to deal with the problem of hybrid entity mismatches. The author analyses the interaction between the double non-taxation outcome and the use of hybrid entities in an approach not strictly linked to any specific tax jurisdiction. To this end, the analysis includes case studies and examples from a range of jurisdictions emphasising the international tax context, also including the application of tax treaties. Among the seminal matters covered in this edition are the following: foundations of the concepts of double non-taxation and hybrid entities; extensive analysis based on the rules of characterisation of foreign entities for tax purposes in the United States, Spain, Denmark, and Germany, as well as on the Poland/United States and Canada/United States tax treaties; in-depth analysis of the implications of Article 1(2) OECD Model Tax Convention and Article 3(1) Multilateral Instrument (MLI), especially considering the position of developing (source) countries; detailed analysis of the OECD BEPS Action 2 and its recommendations (linking rules), including its implementation in the EU Anti-Tax Avoidance Directive (ATAD); and elaborated alternative method to deal with hybrid entity mismatches (reactive coordination rule), which is informed by the tax policy aims of simplicity, coherence, and administrability. Detailed comparisons between the author’s proposal and other existing rules elucidate common points and deviations. If merely for its unparalleled clarification of the issues, this book will prove of immeasurable value to practitioners, tax authorities, policymakers and academics concerned with international tax law. Beyond that, as an authoritative guide that promises to reorient the discussion to what really matters in the debate regarding hybrid entity mismatches, this analysis elaborates solutions applicable to a generality of cases worldwide and, therefore, hugely promotes the urgent quest for alternative views.