Avocado Roundup is a quick review of top tax, legal, and climate news stories. It’s written by humans.
- Around 55 jurisdictions so far have either committed to implementing or expressed intent to implement the global 15% minimum tax starting Jan. 1, 2024, but that uptake will likely reach a critical mass “in the next year or so,” as other countries feel incentive to join the trend, Manal Corwin, head of the OECD’s Center for Tax Policy and Administration says in a recent interview. (FDI Intelligence)
- The global minimum tax is set out by Pillar 2 rules in the two-pillar reform developed by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development to ensure the world’s biggest companies pay a fair amount of tax on their global income starting in 2024. In July, 138 jurisdictions approved an outcome statement for the plan, but to date only about three dozen, including EU member states, have actually committed to implementing starting next Jan. 1, says the OECD’s acting tax division chief, John Peterson. (LegalAvocado.com)
- Peterson commented in an FDI Intelligence interview with Corwin. He says a Pillar 2 backstop mechanism will fuel a snowball effect, by ensuring that if a jurisdiction where a company has economic activity isn’t taxing the company’s income at the minimum rate, other jurisdictions can slap a top-up tax on that income. (FDI Intelligence)
Improve coordination, info exchange to fight dividend fraud, report says
- Tackling dividend tax fraud will require better coordination among domestic and international tax, law enforcement, and financial agencies, including better sharing of information between jurisdictions, according to a new OECD report. The Paris-based organization also released a report on enhancing trust between tax and other financial crime authorities. (OECD.org)
- The OECD released the reports during its Dec. 5-7 forum on tax and crime in Rome, which brought together heads of financial crime agencies and other senior law enforcement authorities from 46 jurisdictions. (OECD.org)
BCLP makes partner hire to launch Luxembourg desk in Paris
- Transatlantic Big Law firm Bryan Cave Leighton Pasiner said Allen & Overy corporate, restructuring, and finance counsel Ambroise Foerster will join the firm as partner in Paris in January, to launch and lead its new Luxembourg desk. Foerster earlier led DLA Piper’s Paris-based Luxembourg desk. BCLP said the new desk meets growing demand from clients for advice on Luxembourg, a center for European regulation of investment funds, ranking second worldwide for volume of investment assets under management. The desk will also boost the firm’s corporate, finance and real estate teams. (BCLPLaw.com)
