Germany Goes Against The Grain
It was encouraging to see German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble rebelling against European Commission proposals for public country-by-country reporting at the latest meeting of EU finance ministers, given the weight of Germany’s voice in the EU. It’s going against the grain these days to question the call for greater corporate transparency. And perhaps there’s an argument that multinational firms could benefit from being more open about their activities from a public relations point of view, in much the same way as offshore jurisdictions like Guernsey have. Yet, as Schäuble suggested, there has to be a balance between “transparency and practicality.”
As Schäuble pointed out to his counterparts in Brussels recently, publishing sensitive company information in the public domain could lead to all sorts of unintended consequences, such as “lining someone up to be pilloried publicly.”
For more information on this, and other topical international tax matters, please visit: https://www.cchgroup.com/roles/corporations/international-solutions/research/global-tax-weekly-a-closer-look
