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Wir werden das Beste (aus beiden Unternehmen) zusammenfassen - Winsome Carly
Intel accused of massive tax evasion
INTEL HAS ALLEGEDLY been indulging in some Scandinavian naughtiness, with Danish tax authorities claiming the firm has tried to slip billions of Kroner past their beady eyes.
Danish news site Politiken says Chipzilla is accused of massive tax evasion to the tune of DKK 2.5 billion ($452,33 million) for transfer pricing - the under-evaluation of exports between affiliated firms to siphon profits out of a territory and nefariously avoid taxes.
"If you sell goods to foreign companies affiliated to a group at a loss, Denmark loses a tax opportunity. The Tax Authority has discovered that billions are being moved abroad," said Professor Aage Mikkelsen, a tax expert at Denmark's Århus Business School.
Denmark, known for its notoriously high taxes, stipulates that any multinational company operating in its territory and trading within itself has to do so at market prices so as not to channel away profits to lower tax areas.
Intel purportedly thought it could pull the wool over Tax Christian Anderson's eyes by snapping up Danish IT company Giga in 2000 for just DKK 9.4 billion. A couple of years later, Chipzilla decided to offload product rights and IP to an affiliated firm for DKK 1.9 billion, which the Danish tax authority now says was well below market price.
Giving Intel a good spanking, the Danish tax authority has now increased Intel's official income by DKK 8 billion, has demanded its money back and is adding interest to boot, resulting in a DKK 3.6 billion ($651,36 million) fine in back taxes for the chip giant.
Professor Mikkelsen described the level of Intel's tax evasion – believed to be Denmark's biggest ever case of transfer pricing – as "shocking".
Even more shocking is the fact Intel pretends to be anti transfer pricing, with a section on the firm's website claiming Chipzilla "supports the work of international organizations, such as the OECD, in their efforts to formulate globally consistent and administratively practical inter-company transfer pricing guidelines".
Intel goes on to say that international double taxation and inter-company transfer pricing disputes "can adversely affect Intel's business. Therefore, we also must consider these issues when making investment decisions, including the location of our facilities".
Whoever considered the issues in this case for Chipzilla, however, must have been more concerned with his cheese-filled Danish pastry than the actual laws of the land though, eh? µ
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Interesting bit of news.
Your use of decimal points is more than a little misleading, typically a comma is used to break up large numbers, i.e. 1,345,678.89
!!!A COMMA IS NOT A DECIMAL POINT!!!
Your figures in USD should have a decimal point, NOT a comma.
It's very misleading!
I don't see any reason to assume that Intel is guilty of what the Danish government has accused. The fact is that many companies turn out to be over valued when purchased so it wouldn't be surprising if the company would have sold on the open market for the same value that Intel set. The question is how do you value these companies and who is the final arbiter. If that's the Danish tax authority then Intel won't have any real way of fighting the charge since they could set the value where ever they want.
The fact is that A LOT of companies do some creative book keeping to help in various fields, from tax evasion to profit inflation...once in a while, they get caught. When they get caught they get slapped so hard as to put fear into others, as well as offset some of the loss that counts against those that are not caught.
Quote:"Your use of decimal points is more than a little misleading, typically a comma is used to break up large numbers, i.e. 1,345,678.89
!!!A COMMA IS NOT A DECIMAL POINT!!!"
In Denmark comma IS a decimal point, a dot is not.
So this is probably a case of copy/pasting that has gone wrong.
US: $452,330,000.00 or $452.33 mill
DK: $452.330.000,00 or $452,33 mill
so cut the yelling and screaming and just comment that the copy paste has gone wrong
Hey Phil,
commas are used in Europe like we use a period for a decimal point. Don't be so uptight, if your having a bad day treat yourself to a beer after work;)
Do the Danish live in a cave with no historical reference to Market values? In Mid 2000 when this acquisition was announced, Intel Stock was at $70 and Giga, like anything related to TeleComm at the time, sat upon a bubble and was massively overvalued. Two years later in 2002 when the IP was transferred, the Tech & Comms bubble had burst, Intel sat at $20 a share, and Comms companies were bankrupt or pennies on the dollar... I'd say Danish tax authority needs to do a little homework.
Are these Danish running out of people to insult. Don't they have cartoons to draw and piss somebody off?
I guess they feel the pinch of disprespecting the world. As a result, their economy is suffering and now they are squeezing corporations to make up.. Intel should not sell anything there and let them go to the dark ages those Wiwis
Of course the danish authorites can't just increase a company's income with impunity. Therefore this case has gone to court and I'm sure that it will hear Intels good arguments.
Just like with the Muhammed cartoon debacle, where even the prime minister couldn't do anything if the court says otherwise. So he couldn't stop the cartoons. It's true. Not just something he tells muslims.
Best regards from Denmark
Tomas
Europe is using it the right way even before America was discovered.
You Yankees have to adjust, it's that simple.
@Bas
"Europe is using "it" the right way."
And by "right way" do you mean whipping "it" out on someones forehead?
Why not just cut spending instead of using mafia tactics on the productive?
Hahahaha...
Sylvie, I love you.
According to http://epn.dk/teknologi2/computer/article1657440.ece (it's in danish wich used to be very like old-english - only 1500 years ago...).
It's not even possible for the danish authorities to tax an american company in the US. It can only go for Intel Denmark and Intel Copenhagen, wich simply doesn't have that kind of money.
So alas, the claim seems unenforceable.
best regards from Denmark
@"The last one left with a brain"
You don't seem to know what a socialist country is - even if it bit you in the arse.
Phil's comment about the decimal separators being "misleading" should really be rephrased as "inconsistent."
Since the INQ is a UK-operated journalism website with its contents in English (which uses decimal-points, not commas), it really ought to stick to the British-standard. So don't think it's just Americans that use it. The US, and many other countries, use decimal-points and comma-thousands-separators because the British use it. Mainland Europeans probably use the comma because of France's use.
Why Sylvie decided to use a "convention" that is neither British nor European (decimal-commas for the USD, decimal-points for the DKK, what?!) is pretty crazy. Stick with one.
If anyone confused $452,33 with $452,330.00 they were reading too fast in the first place. Second, who cares if it's $452,33 or $452,330.00? It's a lot for you and me, peanuts for INtel and the Danes, and really they're arguing about principal.
A couple of issues.
Denmark is NOT a socialist country.
The Danish Tax authorities will NOT tax Intel in the US, only the branch in Denmark. Of course it cannot go after Intel in the us. And it is not trying to.
The Tax authorities are NOT setting the rules and demanding whatever they want to charge Intel for. They have put a claim forward that Intel has sold below market value to avoid taxation. This is against the law, and Intel in Denmark has to abide by the law.
This will be put to a court of law and tested. The outcome of that will decide what will happen.
The goverment cannot rule in a case like this - that is why we have that concept of separation of power.
Which is also why the Prime Minister could not do anything against the Muhammed drawings, as tomas states above. Unless he wants to try to pass a law of censorship... and good luck with that.
The Muhammed case was stupid, but not illegal.
Yes, Denmark is a major socialist country. A few facts for the uneducated people who incorrectly claim that Denmark is not a socialist country.
80% of Denmark employees belong to unions.
38% (800,000 people)[62] of the total Denmark workforce in public sector jobs
25% VAT
Minimum tax rate for adults is 42% scaling to 63%, population average for 2006 was 49.6%
Registration tax on private vehicles, at a rate of 180%, on top of VAT
What a hell hole!
so where do you live? If you've traveled, you would notice that Denmark is one of the finest organized states, that offers everyone a fairly good chance to have a good living. I live in Germany, next to the Danish border and I can only say that Germany(which can still be considered the greatest political power in EU) can only dream to be as good as Denmark... You would be suprised to see how many Germans are beginning to search for a work in Denmark.
so unions and high taxes equals a socialist country?
If you ever looked up what a socialist country is, then the primary difference is desire to have the state own means of production and distribute the goods.
This does not happen in Denmark.
We believe that every inhabitant in our country have at least 2 rights:
1)the right to educate yourself - meaning that we provide free education AND pay students so they don't have to to work, but can actually focus on those studies. Education should not depend on how much money your earn.
2)the right to be healthy - meaning that doctors and hospitals are available free of charge to anybody regardless of how much money you make.
To be able to provide these goals, everybody has to pay a higher tax percentage. But this does NOT make Denmark a socialist country. You have every chance to start your own business and become successfull, become whatever you want to be - nothing is preventing you from that. The government is supporting - not controlling