However, despite Trump's repeated threats to retaliate against French wines, only sparkling wines such as Champagne made the tariff list. Most tech giants have millions of users in France and make big money - for example Amazon recorded €25 million profit in France last year - but pay negligible amounts of tax. Macron has described this system as "crazy" saying that it effectively gives permanent tax haven status to tech companies. Last month, G20 ministers meeting in Washington opened talks on an international system to tax global tech giants that the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development hopes would take effect by June. That tariff list included French cheese, but specifically exempted the strong blue cheese Roquefort.

Source: The Local December 03, 2019 07:41 UTC