Full coverage: Multinationals

The US President's warm visit to Ireland looked a lot like a pre-campaign launch. The Democrats want to make the tax paid by multinationals a voting issue in next year's US election, with huge potential consequences for Ireland's public finances.

The Biden administration’s budget reforms have so far circled around Ireland’s tax advantage without harming it. This wasn’t always the plan, so what will happen in the future?

The software multinational had more employees, booked more profit and paid more tax here last year than ever. The UK’s success in wresting over €800m worth of taxable profit out of Ireland barely made a difference.

Despite scant details in the technology giant’s disclosures about its business in Ireland, we can deduce a lot from the latest figures released by its Irish subsidiaries and the Exchequer to understand what is happening with its soaring tax bills.

The Californian technology giant is the only corporation capable of causing the swell in six-monthly tax figures observed since late 2021. The dates and figures match.

The Government is moving towards a new top-up tax to fill the gap between the 12.5% standard corporation tax rate and the internationally-agreed 15% for multinationals, in a format designed to suit US groups operating here.

There is another multinational sector in Ireland, the one we tend to forget about. It is far less glitzy than the tech sector, but far more permanent, requiring as it does huge investments in plant, machinery, and specialised labour to make its products real.

The technology giant’s fastest-growing Irish subsidiary paid hundreds of R&D staff €50 million in Amazon shares last year. How much will they get this year?

The online recruitment multinational will inform affected workers this evening of the latest job cuts, following a similar announcement by Meta last week.

Vertiv, the US electrical technology group, acquired E&I Engineering for $1.8 billion in 2021. More than half of this value was for intangible assets, which the group can now amortise against taxable profits.