Tax Tips Alert: New country-by-country reporting – Inland Revenue’s approach Inland Revenue has released its intended approach to implementing the OECD’s recommendations set out in Action 13, relating to transfer pricing documentation and country-by-country reporting (CbCR). This follows the OECD’s release of its Final Reports on Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) in October this year (see Tax Tips Special: Impact of final BEPS reports – a game changer for many businesses). From 2017, New Zealand headquartered corporate groups with annual global revenue exceeding NZ$ 1.2 billion will be required to produce CbCR for the 2016 financial year and subsequent years thereafter. The documentation is expected to list the entities within the group and detail the main business activity of each. Financial information and information relating to tangible assets held will also need to be provided for each jurisdiction in which the group operates. Inland Revenue is still considering whether a law change is required or whether the current law is sufficient to implement these new requirements. Inland Revenue anticipates that the new CbCR requirements will affect only 20 New Zealand head-quartered corporate groups, and will contact each group directly to ensure they are adequately prepared for the new CbCR requirements. However, a significant number of New Zealand subsidiaries will also be impacted to the extent that their offshore parent companies are required to prepare CbCR in their home jurisdictions. Affected groups should contact their transfer pricing advisers in advance of Inland Revenue contact in order to assess the impact of the expected CbCR requirements and to begin preparing for the change as soon as possible. As part of a multinational package, the Australian Parliament has already taken steps to implement Action 13 within the Australian tax regime. Effective from 1 January 2016, CbCR will be a legislative requirement applying to Australian head quartered corporate groups with annual global revenue exceeding AU$ 1 billion. Under the new law, the parent company will be required to file CbCR with the home tax authority. A local and master file will need to be filed with the Australian Taxation Office (ATO). The ATO is expected to release further guidance relating to the administration of CbCR in 2016. The Australian multinational package also introduces new financial reporting disclosure requirements, a new multinational anti avoidance law (MAAL), and increased penalties on adjustments made by the ATO in relation to anti-avoidance and transfer pricing. Further details relating to the impact of the new package on multinationals operating within Australia are available in PwC Australia’s Tax Talk Alert. For more information about the practical implications of implementing CbCR, please refer to our website. Get in touch If you would like to discuss your situation in more detail, please contact: Erin Venter Director, Transfer Pricing T: +64 9 355 8862 E: erin.l.venter@nz.pwc.com Richard McGill Director, Transfer Pricing T: +64 3 374 3093 E: richard.j.mcgill@nz.pwc.com Briar Williams Director, International Tax T: +64 9 355 8531 E: briar.s.williams@nz.pwc.com © 2015 PricewaterhouseCoopers New Zealand. All rights reserved. ‘PwC’ and ‘PricewaterhouseCoopers’ refer to the New Zealand member firm, and may sometimes refer to the PwC network. Each member firm is a separate legal entity. Please see www.pwc.com/structure for further details.