Tax avoidance by major US multinationals has been extremely topical over the last decade since the GFC. One of the MNEs at the forefront of this controversy is Google. It has been able to snare a dominant share of the international online advertising market without paying any significant amounts...

The cash economy and associated tax evasion is an on-going issue for most tax administrators. Tax evasion reduces national tax revenue, shifts the tax burden on to other taxpayers such as salary/wage earners and undermines confidence in the tax system affecting voluntary compliance as well as...

This paper argues that there is too great a reliance placed on anti-avoidance provisions, discretions reposed in the revenue, and judicially developed doctrines as a means of countering tax avoidance. In view of the difficulties in defining and countering tax avoidance, it is suggested that...

This paper examines the role played by shams in tax avoidance in New Zealand and its relationship with the general anti-avoidance rule (GAAR) encapsulated in statutory provisions. It shows that as long as the orthodox conception of the sham is employed, there is no need for such a mechanism to...

The aim of this article is to point to a flaw in one of the measures recently enacted by the New Zealand Government to prevent tax avoidance by large multinational enterprises (MNEs). That measure is section GB 54 of the Income Tax Act 2007, which was added to the Act in July 2018 and which is...

In the latter half of the 1980s the tax climate in Australia and New Zealand changed markedly. While throughout the world there were major tax reforms, the changes in Australasia were more fundamental, and both structural and radical. Major changes that were adopted in one or both of the two...

This article considers the issue of whether or not New Zealand trustees must be recognized as valid parties in New Zealand's treaty network by exploring the various approaches that may be adopted in the interpretation of tax treaties and the diverging constructions of the residence article.New...

This article examines the potential conflict between thin capitalization rules and the OECD Model article on non-discrimination using the New Zealand regime exempli gratia. It is discriminatory to impose a higher tax burden on an enterprise funded with foreign capital. Yet that is the basis for...

In 1999 the Ralph Committee recommended sweeping reforms to the Australian income tax system. Its final report, consisted of eight parts and made 280 recommendations. Many of these have since passed into law in a staggered series of stages since 1999. Numerous CGT-related recommendations were...

This article begins by examining the relationship between thin capitalisation rules and double tax treaties. After examining the potential for a fundamental conflict in this area it looks at the OECD's attempts to resolve the problem (in section 2). In sections 3 and 4, the article examines the...