Ikea is the latest company ensnared in the European Union's sprawling tax probes as regulators look at whether the retailer's revenue deals in the Netherlands allowed it to avoid hundreds of millions of euros of taxes.
The tax breaks may have given Inter Ikea Group, which operated the Swedish furniture maker's franchise business, an unfair advantage over rivals, the European Commission said in an emailed statement Monday. It will probe a 2006 deal on how Ikea calculates a license fee paid by a Dutch unit to a Luxembourg branch where it was exempted from tax. The EU will also look at a 2011 ruling on how the Dutch company paid tax on payments to a Liechtenstein unit.
A probe into Ikea, one of Europe's best-known brands, may ease criticism that EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager has received for focusing on how U.S. companies reduce taxes. She's already ordered Apple, Starbucks, and Amazon.com to repay tax, while a probe of McDonald's Corp. is continuing. She's also suing Ireland for delays in reclaiming about 13 billions euros ($15.3 billion) from Apple during the appeal process.
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