State aid: analysis of the cases of illegal tax benefits granted through tax rulings to some companies that are part of multinational enterprise groups

Evropska komisija je leta 2013 začela preiskovati prakse izdajanja davčnih stališč držav članic Evropske unije z vidika skladnosti s pravili o državnih pomočeh. Preiskava je sledila javnim obtožbam v medijih in nekaterih nacionalnih parlamentih glede ugodnega davčnega obravnavanja nekaterih večnacionalnih skupin podjetij. Komisija je od takrat izdala negativne sklepe, v katerih je odredila izterjavo nezakonito podeljene pomoči, v nekaterih medijsko odmevnih primerih, kot so primeri Starbucks, Apple in Amazon. V teh sklepih Komisija trdi, da člen 107(1) PDEU zahteva, da se transferne cene določajo skladno z neodvisnim tržnim načelom, in da se lahko Komisija pri presoji davčnih stališč sklicuje na Smernice OECD za določanje transfernih cen za mednarodna podjetja in davčne uprave. Ta pristop Komisije je naletel na ostra nasprotovanja. Zoper sklepe Komisije so bile vložene ničnostne tožbe, končno besedo glede pravilnosti argumentacije Komisije bo tako imelo Sodišče EU. Komisija se je v preteklosti že borila proti škodljivi davčni konkurenci z uporabo pravil o državnih pomočeh, takšen pristop je že potrdilo Sodišče EU. Davčno načrtovanje večnacionalnih skupin je čezmejne narave, zato pravila o državnih pomočeh, ki so osredotočena na ravnanje posamezne države članice, ne morejo zajeti vseh vidikov čezmejnega davčnega načrtovanja, ki temelji na izkoriščanju razlik in neskladij med nacionalnimi davčnimi sistemi. Bolj primerno orodje za boj proti davčnemu izogibanju večnacionalnih skupin je harmonizacija nacionalnih davčnih pravil in na tem področju potekajo na ravni EU nekateri pomembni projekti. Nekateri zakonodajni predlogi Komisije so že bili sprejeti, drugi pa so še v postopku sprejemanja.In 2013, European Commission started investigating whether tax ruling practices of the Member States of the European Union comply with the rules on State aid. Investigation followed public allegations of favourable tax treatment of certain multinational enterprises voiced in the media and in some national Parliaments. Since then, the Commission has adopted negative decisions ordering recovery of illegally granted aid in some highly publicized cases, such as Starbucks, Apple and Amazon. In these decisions the Commission claims that Article 107(1) TFEU requires transfer prices to be determined in accordance with the arm\u27s length principle and that, in assessing tax rulings, the Commission may refer to the OECD Transfer Pricing Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises and Tax Administrations. This approach of the Commission encountered strong opposition. Actions for annulment have been brought against the Commission\u27s decisions, the Court of Justice of the EU will therefore have the final word on the correctness of the Commission\u27s argumentation. In the past, the Commission has already fought against harmful tax competition by using the State aid rules and the Court of Justice of the EU has already confirmed such an approach. Since tax planning of multinational groups is of a cross-border nature, the rules on State aid, which are focused on the behaviour of individual Member States, cannot cover all aspects of cross-border tax planning, which is based on the exploitation of differences and mismatches between national tax systems. A more appropriate tool for combating tax avoidance of multinational groups is the harmonization of national tax rules and some important projects are being carried out in this area at the EU level. Some of the Commission\u27s legislative proposals have already been adopted, while others are still in the process of adoption