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Penn State Law to broadcast webinar on tax inversions


Penn State Law's Center for the Study of Mergers and Acquisitions will webcast a free, public interest webinar, An Introduction to Inversions, at 12:30 p.m. on Sept. 17.

Two leading experts in corporate tax law will join Samuel C. Thompson, Jr., professor of law and director of the Center for the Study of Mergers and Acquisitions to discuss how and why tax inversions are employed, the laws that allow them, and possible legislative and administrative actions that could curtail them.

The recently proposed merger of Burger King and Canada's Tim Hortons has put tax inversions into the headlines again, even while other companies, like Endo Health, have recently completed such mergers. Others, including a merger between Medtronic and Covidien, are also in the works.

Inversions employ complex corporate transactions to cause a U.S. company and a foreign company to become subsidiaries of a new foreign holding company with the shareholders of the U.S. company owning a controlling interest in the new holding company. Inversions are often used to move income earned in the U.S. into the foreign holding company, where it is subject to a lower tax rate. They also allow corporations to avoid the U.S. tax that applies when the earnings of a foreign subsidiary of a U.S. corporation are repatriated to the U.S. parent in the form of dividends.

Several members of Congress are concerned with inversions and are considering legislation aimed at deterring them. President Barack Obama recently called inverting companies “corporate deserters” and his administration is urging Congress to take action against inverters. Further, on Sept. 8, Treasury Secretary Jack Lew said, "Treasury is completing an evaluation of what we can do [administratively] to make these deals less economically appealing, and we plan to make a decision in the very near future."

The Penn State Law panel discussion will address these potential federal actions and provide viewers with a primer on inversions, how they’re structured, and the current legal environment they enjoy.

Joining Thompson on the panel are Brian Davis, tax partner in the Washington, D.C., office of Ivins, Phillips & Barker and an expert on international tax and inversions; and Omri Marian, assistant professor of law at the University of Florida Levin College of Law and author of a forthcoming law review article on inversions.

The event will be broadcast live over the Internet from Sutliff Auditorium in the Lewis Katz Building on Penn State’s University Park campus. The public is welcome to attend the free event in person.

Contacts:

Vanessa McLaughlin
vmclaughlin@psu.edu
Work Phone:
814-867-0396
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