international tax arbitrage

The European Court of Justice blessed international tax arbitrage in a VAT transaction by means of which taxpayer was able to obtain a credit for input VAT on purchases while avoiding payment of output VAT on sales. The result was obtained thanks to an inconsistent characterization of the transaction for VAT purposes under UK and German law. UK treated the transaction as a financial service taxable in the country of supplier (Germany), while Germany treated it a as a sale of goods taxable in the country of the goods are sold (UK).
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