Australia: KPMG comments on draft legislation implementing Pillar Two global minimum tax rules

Treasury on 21 March 2024 released for consultation draft legislation implementing key aspects of the OECD’s Pillar Two global minimum tax rules. Read TaxNewsFlash

In response to the request for comments, KPMG tax professionals provided a submission to Treasury making the following key points:

• The number of provisions worded differently from the OECD rules needs to be minimized, particularly when they could produce different outcomes. In addition, guidance confirming when existing Australian tax concepts are relevant to definitions within the Australian global anti-base erosion rules (GloBE) rules would be helpful.
• Relief from penalties for the initial years of application of the Australian GloBE rules needs to be specifically provided.
• A designated local entity needs to be allowed to file one return that aggregates jurisdictional data with the other constituent entities (CEs) that are required to file these returns, rather than the returns for each of the CEs being filed on a stand-alone basis.
• Various duplicative domestic tax integrity measures need to be scaled back (i.e., the financing integrity measure in the hybrid mismatch rules needs to be amended so that top-up tax is regarded for the purpose of determining whether the 10% threshold is met).