Billions in unpaid tax from shopping centre sales: report
PR dla Zagranicy
Victoria Bieniek
26.04.2018 14:03
Poland’s budget may have lost billions because of a scam which saw corporate groups set up to avoid paying tax on the sale of major shopping centres, the wPolityce.pl website has reported.
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According to the website, corporate groups were set up so that profits from the sale of shopping centres could be “donated” to sister companies and transferred abroad without paying tax.
The website claimed that a shopping centre could be built for around PLN 100 million and, after leasing retail space, sold to a related, offshore company for PLN 1 billion.
During the sale, the company would be restructured and assets would change hands in order to avoid a 19 percent corporate income tax, wPolityce.pl said.
The Polish Finance Ministry has banned such illegal tax evasion schemes, wPolityce.pl said, adding that the ministry may order companies to reimburse the state for losses. (vb)