Transfer Pricing

Tax Cooperation Policy Brief No. 37, 29 January 2024

A Decade of the Indian Advance Pricing Agreement Programme: Achievements and Challenges

By Priyanka Mashelkar and Apoorv Tiwari

India’s Advance Pricing Agreement (APA) programme was introduced in 2012 with the objective of reducing transfer pricing disputes and providing certainty to taxpayers on their international transactions. In the last decade or so, the programme has proven to be a successful dispute mitigation and resolution mechanism. The authors use data and statistics from a recently released report by the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) in India to highlight the success of the programme, while also acknowledging the challenges ahead, especially as taxpayers’ expectations from the programme continue to rise.

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Research Paper 164, 23 September 2022

Impact of a Minimum Tax Rate under the Pillar Two Solution on Small Island Developing States

By Kuldeep Sharma

The Research Paper commences with an overview of Pillar One and Pillar Two followed by detailed discussions on salient provisions of Pillar Two.

Pillar Two is envisaged to have a widespread impact on Small Island Developing States (SIDS) which are a distinct group of 38 United Nations (UN) Member States and 20 Non-UN Members/Associate Members of UN regional commissions that are exposed to unique social, economic and environmental vulnerabilities. In all, 36 SIDS that are members of the Group of Seventy-Seven (G-77) have been analysed, namely, Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas, Bahrain, Barbados, Belize, Cabo Verde, Comoros, Cuba, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Fiji, Grenada, Guinea-Bissau, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Kiribati, Maldives, Marshall Islands, Mauritius, Federated States of Micronesia, Nauru, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, São Tomé and Príncipe, Seychelles, Singapore, Solomon Islands, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, Timor-Leste, Tonga, Trinidad and Tobago, and Vanuatu.

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Submission on Draft Agenda of the UN Tax Committee, September 2021

Comments on Draft Agenda of the UN Tax Committee

The South Centre welcomes the UN Tax Committee’s invitation of public comments into its draft agenda and four-year work plan. By engaging the public in preparing the work plan, the UN Tax Committee’s work can be more responsive to the needs of developing countries, and of UN Member States as a whole. By stating that “the goal to ensure that the Committee’s agenda is practical and relevant to developing countries and includes the most pressing challenges they face in tax policy and administration” the Committee has shown a laudable intent which is also in line with its mandate, which is to give special attention to developing countries. The South Centre offers its written comments on the three topics on which inputs have been requested. These have been prepared based on consultation with the South Centre’s Member States, which are exclusively developing countries.

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Tax Cooperation Policy Brief 12, September 2020

Base Erosion and Profit Shifting in the Extractive Industries

By Danish and Daniel Uribe

Developing countries with significant natural resources have not fully utilised them for financing their development aspirations. Extractive industries and the revenue generated from their extractive activities need to constitute a larger share of domestic resource mobilisation. However, the sector remains beset with massive tax base erosion and profit shifting by large multinational companies. This policy brief therefore looks at the extractive industries, and the potential impact of their practices on the national policies and regulations in developing countries. It further also considers some current initiatives at the international level for enabling countries to obtain more revenue from natural resource extraction, and offers some observations on the policy options available to developing countries.

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Tax Cooperation Policy Brief 11, February 2020

The Role of South-South Cooperation in Combatting Illicit Financial Flows

By Manuel F Montes

Developing countries bear the brunt of costs from illicit financial flows (IFFs). These losses are the result of the facilities that the global system provides transnational companies, operating in multiple tax jurisdictions, to move their profits to favorable locations. International cooperation has been seen to be a key ingredient in restricting IFFs. However, a difference in interests in the treatment of many types of transactions between developed and developing countries is an obstacle to a fast solution of the problem. Developing countries must seek to seize the initiative to restrict their losses from IFFs. They can deploy various joint and concerted actions, within the umbrella of the principles of South-South cooperation for this purpose.

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Book by the South Centre, 2019

International Tax Cooperation: Perspectives from the Global South

About the Book:

A substantive reform of the global tax system involving a variety of multilateral platforms is underway.  The question is not whether the tax standards and practices will change, but in which direction.

Developing countries have long sought changes in rules, standards and procedures shaping the allocation of taxing rights among sovereign states. In the wake of the 2008-2010 Great Recession, developed country governments engaged in massive public sector layoffs and channeling enormous public resources to bail out large financial companies and their wealthy investors.  The Panama Papers, the Paradise Papers, the Lux Leaks became household words in the United States and Europe because of the journalistic coverage.  Other scandals, such as the “cum/ex” fraud in Germany involving a loophole in the taxing of dividend receipts were less known but just as materially significant.  Tax reform, particularly as it applied to the treatment of corporations working in multiple tax jurisdictions, thus became not only a problem of developing countries but an issue of global concern.

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The South Centre Monthly, July 2019

Inequality is one of the greatest challenges that the world needs to face. Inequality is intimately linked with poverty. Although there has been progress in reducing poverty, a large part of the global population (overwhelmingly living in developing countries) is still denied access to a dignified life. While no poverty and reduced inequality are two of the outstanding Sustainable Development Goals, these and other goals are unlikely to be achieved by 2030. In fact, inequality is on the rise. Changing this situation will certainly require significant efforts at the national and regional level. But it also requires an international architecture that supports those efforts by respecting the policy space that countries need and coordinating constructive actions within the multilateral system. The current initiatives to ‘reform’ this system will only be legitimate if they recognize the gaps in the levels of development and contribute to effectively address them under a fair, pro-development system of rules. Please see last month’s SouthViews on “Understanding global inequality in the 21st century” by Jayati Ghosh, development economist and Professor of Economics at Jawaharlal Nehru University.

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Tax Cooperation Policy Brief 8, July 2019

Improving Transfer Pricing Audit Challenges in Africa through Modern Legislation and Regulations

By Thulani Shongwe

Auditing multinational enterprises often involves a broad range of complex technical issues, and transfer pricing (TP) is often the most important one. This policy brief looks at some of the key aspects of the modern TP legislation and illustrates how different drafting of regulations can assist in additional revenue collection as well as increased compliance. It further provides practical examples from real cases to show where poor legislation has given rise to tax planning and to profit shifting. Lastly, the brief offers practical solutions to some of the transactions illustrated through the African Tax Administration Forum (ATAF) Suggested Approach to Drafting Transfer Pricing Legislation.

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Tax Cooperation Policy Brief 3, August 2018

Interaction of Transfer Pricing & Profit Attribution: Conceptual and Policy Issues for Developing Countries

By Dr. Vinay Kumar Singh

Till 2010, model tax conventions treated profit attribution to permanent  establishments  and transfer  pricing under  different  articles,  and  profit  attribution under Article  7  allowed sales to be taken into account both in the direct accounting method as well as the indirect apportionment  method.  However,  the  revised  Article  7  in  the  2010 update of the OECD Convention approximated profit  attribution  with  transfer  pricing  and  omitted  the option  of  apportionment,  thereby  undermining  sales  and contributions   made   by   market   jurisdiction   to   business profits. When a tax treaty retains Article 7 based on the UN Convention  or  the  earlier  OECD  Convention,  Contracting States  can  take  sales  into  account  and  also  opt  for  apportionment.  Developing  countries  need  to  fully  understand these implications of  Article  7 in their tax treaties, and opt for informed choices for transfer pricing and profit attribution  to  permanent  establishments,  including  apportionment that takes sales into account.

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