Vodafone/India conciliation: legal but unlikely and not imminent
Just days after taking over at the Law Ministry, Kapil Sibal has said it would be legal for the Rs112bn tax dispute with Vodafone to be solved via conciliation, overturning the decision of his predecessor, Ashwani Kumar.
On the face of it, this sounds like we’re approaching a conclusion. But foreign investors, for whom this is a test case, shouldn’t breathe a sigh of relief quite yet. Continue reading »
Chinese SOEs and “invisible benefits”
Chinese people are used to hearing about the extraordinary benefits enjoyed by employees of big state-owned enterprises. But the size and scope of such benefits still delivered a shock when the National Audit Office released its annual reports on 10 SOEs and further exposed the extent of the problem.
Among the 10 were China Mobile, China Huaneng Group, China Publishing Group and other SOEs and, notably, their subsidiaries. They were found to have violated financial regulations by offering staff a variety of “invisible benefits”, according to audit reports for 2012 on the NAO’s website. Continue reading »
BMW latest target in India’s tax push
The Indian government has for some time been clamping down on tax evasion by big multinationals, chasing up on everything from fictional factories to complicated accounting tricks as it tries to shore up the country’s troubled finances.
Now it’s BMW’s turn under the lens. The German car maker is under investigation after reports that it owes import duties of as much as $120m. Continue reading »
India’s latest blackout: TV ads
Cheesy taglines, catchy tunes and cringingly overdramatic delivery make adverts an important part of Indian television – they’re a topic of conversation as often as the TV shows themselves.
But this week, to the delight of many, several broadcasters have cut ads on the back of a tax dispute. Continue reading »
Poland: frightening the frackers
There’s a Polish saying about not dividing the skin on a bear – in other words waiting before the animal is caught before planning a warm coat. That’s a saying Poland’s finance ministry might do well to remember as it prepares a new tax regime for the oil and gas industry.
The proposed tax rates have the industry screaming. Continue reading »
Uganda vs Heritage: what’s the score?
After coming out on top against Heritage Oil in a tax appeal tribunal at home, the Ugandan Revenue Authority claims to be winning the away leg in London as it chases the Jersey-based company for a tax bill of $435m.
Heritage disputes the claim, and says the arbitration is still at a preliminary phase. A swift conclusion seems unlikely, but the case signals a determination on the part of the Ugandan government to ensure it gets a cut of the spoils in its nascent oil industry, and underlines the risks facing investors.
India’s SUV tax: missing the point?
Is that an SUV or not?
Last month, India’s finance minister Palaniappan Chidambaram upped the excise duty on sports utility vehicles (SUVs) from 27 per cent to 30 per cent in the Union Budget.
But now, India’s minister for heavy industries, Praful Patel, has written to the finance minister asking him to withdraw the tax hike, after the auto industry reported the worst monthly sales figures in a decade. Continue reading »
Cadbury’s sticky situation over ‘imaginary’ Indian factory
How do you tax a factory that doesn’t exist? This seems to be the problem vexing India’s revenue authorities, who have accused UK-based confectioner Cadbury of dodging roughly $46m in bills, by pretending to churn out its famous Dairy Milk chocolates in an entirely imaginary new facility. Continue reading »
Philippines taxman says it with flowers
There is no rest for Philippine taxmen even on St Valentine’s Day. While others were buying flowers for loved ones or taking them out on a date, officials at the Bureau of Internal Revenue spent February 14 filing criminal complaints against the owners of two famous flower shops in Manila for failing to issue proper receipts. Continue reading »
India lays out its bewildering stall to first-time retail equity investors
A glut of new investment products appeared in India over the weekend, designed to bring first-time retail investors into the country’s stock markets with a generous tax break. Good news, surely? Well, characteristically for India’s asset management industry, the truth is more complicated than it needs to be. Continue reading »
Seoul rattles sabre in currency war
A new skirmish in the currency wars? South Korea is preparing to fight ‘speculative’ investors betting on the won, as the currency’s appreciation against the US dollar and the Japanese yen erodes Korean exporters’ competitiveness.
The won has weakened against the dollar this year, losing 2 per cent. But that was after a 4.6 per cent gain in the last three months of 2012. Against the yen, which is crucial for Korean exporters, the won is up 3.4 per cent this year, following a 16 per cent gain in Q4 2012. No wonder Seoul is sabre-rattling. Continue reading »
Illicit flows: the biggest losers
Dodgy money is once again leaving emerging markets in large quantities: illicit flows out of 71 developing economies were worth $859bn in 2010, up from $776bn a year earlier. The latest figures is only slightly less than the all time high of $871bn recorded in 2008.
That is the conclusion of a report published this week by Global Financial Integrity and funded by the Ford Foundation Continue reading »
Guest post: For Brazil, the sweet dream is over
By Marcos Troyjo of Columbia University
The timid expansion of Brazil’s GDP in the past 12 months at under 1 per cent deals a hard blow to the notion that its policy makers had devised an economic model uniting high growth with social inclusion. This sweet dream is over. It is wrong to assume that the set of policies Brazil has put in place in the past few years to boost its economy and upgrade its social data are pillars of a new development model. Continue reading »
ANC congress: nationalisation or tax? Both will leave investors rattled
The tricky beast of nationalisation is on the agenda at the ANC’s Mangaung conference, where party members are meeting to elect leaders and discuss key decisions on critical policies.
A rejection of outright nationalisation has been set out, but analysts say that the looming alternative of higher taxation is a bitter a pill to swallow for investors and the country’s struggling mining industry. Continue reading »
Ryanair in Budapest: good with numbers?
As beyondbrics reported on Wednesday, Ryanair is to cut ten of its routes into Budapest. The low-cost airline will also reduce frequencies on nine of its remaining 20 routes into the Hungarian capital from January 10, 2013, chief executive Michael O’Leary confirmed on Thursday in Budapest, blaming rising fees imposed by Budapest Airport and the Hungarian Civil Aviation Authority. Continue reading »
| About this blog | Headlines email | Blog guide |
| Regulars | Series | Archive |
Older entries
Stefan Wagstyl
Rob Minto
Pan Kwan Yuk
Jonathan Wheatley
Heba Saleh