Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-77f85d65b8-8wtlm Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-04-15T16:05:44.159Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

4 - Corporate Tax Arbitrage

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 December 2025

Ronen Palan
Affiliation:
City University London
Get access

Summary

This chapter explores the evolution and techniques of corporate tax arbitrage, focusing on how multinational corporations (MNCs) exploit the structural features of the international tax regime. It traces the origins of the system to the 1928 League of Nations framework, which privileged source and residence taxation while neglecting valuation and the treatment of intangible assets. This omission, combined with the legal autonomy granted to subsidiaries within centrally coordinated multi-corporate enterprises, created enduring arbitrage opportunities. The chapter analyses how firms leverage intangible assets, ownership structures, and corporate residency rules to reallocate profits across jurisdictions, exploiting regulatory mismatches. It highlights the role of offshore financial centres (OFCs), intermediary subsidiaries, and hybrid instruments in enabling tax avoidance. Case studies – such as Apple’s use of stateless entities and Amazon’s transfer of losses via Luxembourg – illustrate how MNCs circumvent tax rules through entity design, subsidiary chaining, and strategic use of global value chains. Using new evidence from the CORPLINK study, the chapter estimates that although OFC intermediaries represent only 1.7 per cent of subsidiaries among the world’s top 100 non-financial firms, they control up to two-thirds of group revenues. Tax arbitrage is shown to be systemic, not exceptional, and embedded in contemporary corporate structures.

Information

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Book purchase

Temporarily unavailable

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

  • Corporate Tax Arbitrage
  • Ronen Palan, City University London
  • Book: Profit and Power
  • Online publication: 18 December 2025
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009605298.006
Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

  • Corporate Tax Arbitrage
  • Ronen Palan, City University London
  • Book: Profit and Power
  • Online publication: 18 December 2025
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009605298.006
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Corporate Tax Arbitrage
  • Ronen Palan, City University London
  • Book: Profit and Power
  • Online publication: 18 December 2025
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009605298.006
Available formats
×