LONDON (Alliance News) - Royal Dutch Shell PLC has "hit back" against claims regarding its relocation from London to the Netherlands, which resulted in a EUR7 billion loss of income to the Dutch treasury, the Guardian reported on Monday.
Dutch newspaper Trouw claimed that the British-Dutch multinational oil & gas company's Dutch tax authority agreement conflicted with EU rules and that Shell owes "as much as EUR7 billion" in taxes.
"I am astonished about the way we are portrayed in Trouw. This is tendentious. The fact that our headquarters is in the Netherlands … has been very good for the Dutch treasury," Shell Nederland President Director Marjan van Loon said in a statement.
The Netherlands has a dividend withholding tax and Shell created an A/B share structure when it relocated to "protect its UK based shareholders" according to the Guardian.
As part of Shell's headquarter merger in the Netherlands Dutch tax authorities exempted the UK based B shares from paying the withholding tax on dividends if payments were routed through Jersey.
"No tax is levied on dividends from B shares, provided that they are paid via the so-called dividend access mechanism," the company said in a statement.
"The right to levy dividend withholding tax on dividends paid to shareholders in the former British parent company has never existed in the Netherlands," it continued.
A Dutch MP told Trouw he would refer the case to Brussels.
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/jun/18/shell-hits-back-at-criticism-of-tax-structure
