Iron Ore Price, page-2642

When your competition has worked out how NOT to pay the same tax that everyone else does, no wonder they can sell their product below their competitors' cost of production. And these low-lifes are perfectly happy to talk openly about driving the little guys out of the industry. ("But it's legal" chorus the scumbags!)

BHP Billiton fighting $522m tax demand

BHP Billiton has been hit with a $522 million bill that the tax office says it owes for tax avoidance through its Singapore marketing operations.
BHP Billiton has responded to questions from the Senate inquiry into tax avoidance, saying it is contesting the Australian Taxation Office assessments, which are continuing.
Of the $522 million, $221 million is penalties for alleged tax avoidance.
BHP’s announcement comes after it revealed earlier this month that it was being audited by the ATO over the activities of its Singapore marketing hub.
BHP and Rio Tinto came under scrutiny at the Senate inquiry over accusations they use their Singapore operations to shift revenue and reduce the taxes they pay on the earnings from the commodities they mine in Australia.
BHP said today its Singapore marketing arm earned profits of $US5.7 billion between the years of 2006 and 2014, and had paid just $US121,000 in tax in Singapore on those profits.
Meanwhile, the group paid $945 million in Australia in relation to those profits during the same period.
BHP also revealed, in its response to the Senate inquiry, that it paid $8.46m campaigning against then-prime minister Kevin Rudd’s mining super profits tax.
The miner had previously disclosed to the Australian Electoral Commissionthat it had directly spent $4.21m campaigning against the resource super profits tax.
But today’s submission showed BHP had also contributed $4.25m to the Minerals Council of Australia’s effort during the same period between 2009 and 2010. The Minerals Council has made its own filing to the Electoral Commission.
BHP confirmed the group and its Singapore marketing hub were being subjected to two ongoing audits by the tax office covering the period between 2009 and 2014.
The ATO was auditing a transfer pricing matter, relating to the price at which BHP sells the commodities it produces to its Singapore arm, and separately, a controlled foreign company matter looking at whether the Singapore arm’s profit is subject to Australia’s “top-up” tax laws.
The audits cover a period when BHP and its marketing hub earned around $US5.4 billion.
While Rio Tinto had provided details of the profits and taxes paid by its Singapore operation to the Senate inquiry, BHP earlier this month declined to do so. BHP head of group tax Jane Michie said the ATO’s view on what BHP owed was “kind of not really relevant”.
However, publicly available documents filed in Singapore showed the company paid no tax on profits of $US941 million in the last financial year.
Both Rio and BHP, which rank as the nation’s single biggest corporate taxpayers, defended their reputations, saying they fully complied with their obligations and paid billions to government in tax and royalties every year.
With AAP