Tax Havens and Disclosure Aggregation
Forthcoming, Journal of International Business Studies
44 Pages Posted: 24 Apr 2017
There are 2 versions of this paper
Tax Havens and Disclosure Aggregation
Date Written: April 24, 2017
Abstract
Multinational firms have been accused by politicians, regulators, and citizen groups of shifting profits to low-tax geographic areas. We present evidence that multinational firms with tax-haven operations tend to aggregate their geographic disclosures to a greater extent. The results are consistent with managers attempting to avoid criticism by reducing the transparency of their tax-avoidance activities. We find these results to be stronger for larger firms with higher political costs and for firms in natural-resources industries, in retail industries, or with low competition. The evidence is relevant to policy makers and others interested in multinational firms’ financial reporting and tax activities.
Keywords: Tax havens, aggregation, disclosure transparency, tax avoidance, geographic reporting, Exhibit 21
JEL Classification: H25, H26, F23, F30, M41, G30
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation