It’s often stated that crude oil and natural gas (hereafter energy) prices are determined by supply and demand conditions. The empirical evidence shows that this notion is false because energy prices follow an autoregressive mechanism. Energy prices approach a random walk in which the autoregression slope coefficient is not different from one.
To grasp the legalese of my initial encounters with the 1968 US transfer pricing regulations (under section 482 published in the Federal Register (33 FR 5848), April 16, 1968), I translated the three specified transfer pricing methods (CUP, resale price and cost plus) into algebra and found a multiplier formula tying them together.
I created a two equation system including an accounting equation and a stochastic equation, and obtained the reduced-form equation to estimate the price (CUP) or the selected gross profit indicator. Using the same multiplier procedure, I developed the CPM/TNMM in 1989.
A recent TaxNotes piece called for a substantial rewrite of Section 1.482-4, which addresses the transfer of intangible assets. The author, Ryan Finley, suggests that the Comparable Uncontrolled Transaction (CUT/CUP) approach should be relegated to a much more limited role. While many of the his assessments are fair, we would urge caution before relegating CUT too far to the backbench. There are certainly situations where CUT approaches are not only useful, but necessary as part of a larger framework to capture the issues and facts of the specific intercompany issue, examples of which we note later on.
Swiss multinational employment service provider Adecco recently prevailed in a case brought by the Danish tax authority (Skattestyrelsen or SKAT) challenging the 2% sales royalty paid by Adecco affiliate in Denmark for the use of various intangible assets, including trademarks and know-how.
The arguments put forth by the taxpayer and SKAT represented the classic tension between market versus profits-based approaches to evaluating arm’s length royalties. The 3-2 split decision and SKAT’s less-than-comprehensive analysis in its argument also may have left room for the possibility that a more robust analysis could have led to a different result.
European affiliates of multinationals such as IKEA face scrutiny from a variety of agencies including the European Union (EU), which issued EU Council Directive 2011/16 also known as DAC6. The stated purpose of DAC6, which became effective on June 25, 2018, is to provide transparency and fairness in taxation. DAC6 applies to cross-border tax arrangements between EU affiliates and tax havens. One of these cross-border tax arrangements is intercompany royalty payments from EU affiliates to affiliate in tax havens such as Liechtenstein. Such intercompany payments by European affiliates of IKEA are being challenged by the European Commission in a State Aid inquiry, which was initiated on December 18, 2017, according to an EC press release:
The comparable uncontrolled price (CUP) method is described in US Treas. Reg. §1.482-3(b).
We hold that the empirical verification of CUP transactions is best measured by regression analysis.
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