After Apple Lossless Audio CODEC (ALAC), e Google, also Ikea ends up in the crosshairs of the European Antitrust. Brussels has announced that it has opened an in-depth investigation into the tax regime from which the Swedish group has benefited in the Netherlands.
In particular, the European Commission suspects that two tax settlements of 2006 and 2011 have allowed Ikea to pay less taxes, thus obtaining, according to an EU statement, an anti-competitive advantage over other operators, in violation of European state aid regulations.
“All companies, large or small, multinational or not, have to pay their share of taxes – says the Commissioner responsible for competition, Margrethe Vestager in the note – Member countries cannot let selected companies pay less tax by artificially shifting their profits somewhere else. Now we will examine in depth the tax treatment of Ikea in the Netherlands”.
In particular, Ikea is accused of having created two distinct groups through a network of companies in the Netherlands, Luxembourg and Liechtenstein, thanks to which it was able to move profits and take advantage of lower taxes.
The mechanism would have allowed the Swedish giant to evade hundreds of millions of taxes across the European Union. According to a study by the Greens at the European Parliament carried out in 2016, through two foundations based in Lichtenstein and Holland, Ikea would have managed to elude around one billion euros in taxes between 2009 and 2014.
McDonald's and the French energy company Engie also ended up in the crosshairs of the European Commission's investigations. In recent months, the Commission ordered Apple to pay a record amount of back taxes of up to €13 billion in Ireland, Starbucks up to €30 million in the Netherlands and Amazon €250 million in Luxembourg.
