Ireland affirms its corporate tax at the same low level

04.08.2014

 Irish Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation published policy statement on Foreign Direct Investments (FDI) in Ireland. Head of the Department, Richard Bruton, stated that Ireland shall improve regulation of FDI for international corporations.

He emphasized that the situation with FDI has dramatically changed in the country for the last few years. The competition between International Corporation rose.

The statement says that Ireland’s main advantage as to other jurisdiction is effective enforcement of law and political commitments.

The general trend of FDI regulation is improvement of companies’ international activity with the stress on the export and trade.

The statement also announce that the corporate tax rate in the country continues to be at the level of 12, 5%. Also, there were stated following aims in the sphere of corporate taxation:

• continuance of strong, stable and predictable for investors economic environment;

• participation in OECD and European Commission activities in the sphere of international taxation.

Source: http://www.djei.ie/publications/enterprise/2014/Policy_Statement_FDI_Ireland_July_2014.pdf

Expert’s opinion

 Ireland is famous because most of international corporate giants, such as Apple, Microsoft, Google and others, used this jurisdiction in their business schemes. Ireland really is relatively convenient country for business: jurisdiction is not on in any “black” lists; corporate tax rate for Europe is relatively low; jurisdiction has wide net of agreements on avoidance of double taxation. Nonetheless, there are some difficulties – company has to have the registered office in Ireland and at least on director – resident of EU. Ireland reasonably decided to keep its most important advantage – corporate tax rate of 12,5%. It will allow to consider this jurisdiction as a good option for business optimization

Alexandra Mikhno ( Lawyer, Honest & Bright)