Google moved 10.7 billion euros ($12 billion) through the Netherlands to Bermuda in 2014, as part of a structure which allows it to earn most of its foreign income tax free.
Accounts for Google Netherlands Holdings BV published on Thursday show the unit transferred almost all its revenue, mainly royalties from an Irish affiliate through which most non-U.S. revenue is channeled, to a Bermuda-based, Irish-registered affiliate called Google Ireland Holdings.
The tax strategy is known to accountants as the "double Irish, Dutch Sandwich'. It allows Google, now part of holding company Alphabet Inc, to avoid triggering U.S. income taxes or European withholding taxes on the funds, which represent the bulk of the group's overseas profits.
You can read the rest @
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-google-tax-idUSKCN0VS1GP
The actor Wesley Snipes was imprisoned for doing something similar. You can read about it here:
http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/people/2013/04/05/wesley-snipes-finishes-jail-time-for-tax-evasion/2057455/
So ... a citizen who fails to pay $7 million is a "tax cheat", but a corporation which fails to pay any tax on $12 billion of income is somehow a shining example of clever accounting?
Funk dat !!!
Oh ... did I forget to mention that Snipes is black, while Google appears to be lily-white? Maybe that had something to do with it.
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