The European Parliament has approved new rules for financial reporting for large international companies operating in the EU. Now Apple, Google and other transnational corporations will have to disclose data about what kind of profit they receive in each European country for more fair taxation.

In accordance with the new country-by-country reporting rules, companies that receive annual revenues of at least € 750 million will be accountable for their operations in each EU country.

Now corporations submit a general report, which gives them the opportunity to pay taxes under the laws of those states where taxes are lower. For this, income is simply transferred from one country to another. That is, in fact, Apple, Google and other companies use tax evasion schemes. According to the vice-president of the European Commission Valdis Dombrovskis, the EU countries annually receive less from such corporations from 50 to 70 billion euros.

The authorities of the European Union have been concerned with the improvement of the tax law with respect to large corporations after a number of scandals around Apple, Google, Starbucks and others..

Earlier, the EC initiated an investigation into the governments of Ireland, the Netherlands and Luxembourg in connection with the preferential tax treatment that was used on their territory by some international corporations that carried out their European receipts through offices registered in some European countries with preferential tax treatment. Last year, for this reason, the manufacturer of the iPhone was obliged to pay back to the Irish authorities unpaid taxes of € 13 billion.

Irish tax law for several years allowed Apple to pay a tax of 1%, and then 0,005% of the profit. Corporate income tax rate in Ireland is 12.5%.

However, the peculiarities of local regulations allowed Apple to transfer Irish branch revenues to a head office that exists only on paper. As a result, this money was not taxed in any country.

Two years ago, the European Commission launched a "process of public discussion on the transparency of corporate tax legislation" - as a result, it led to the development of changes in reporting, which yesterday and approved by the European Parliament. Now the changes should be approved by parliaments and governments of the EU countries.