Ireland has fought back against EU claims that it is owed €13bn by US tech giant Apple, in a landmark case that is set to conclude next year. The underpayment, the Commission said, amounted to illegal state aid and allowed Apple to pay an effective corporate tax rate of just 0.005pc in 2014. Apple and Ireland fought that ruling and won, in a lower EU court, in 2020. “The profits we’re talking about - those profits were in fact subject to the US tax regime.”The Apple case is one of many novel tax decisions taken by competition chief Margrethe Vestager under the bloc’s state aid rules. She has lost similar cases involving McDonald’s, Starbucks and carmaker Fiat’s tax affairs in Luxembourg and The Netherlands.

Source: Irish Independent May 24, 2023 03:32 UTC