Tax Practices

Larry Page's family office Koop was converted from California and reincorporated in Delaware in late December 2025. He purchased $173.4 million in Miami real estate in January 2026. The moves came ahead of California's proposed wealth tax that would require billionaires worth over $1 billion to pay 5% of assets. Page, worth approximately $270 billion, would owe roughly $13 billion under the proposal.

In May 2025, Guillaume Pousaz switched his country of residence from the UK to Monaco, just a year after arriving in London from Dubai. The move allowed him to avoid changes to the UK's non-dom regime and increased taxes on capital gains introduced by Chancellor Rachel Reeves. Pousaz has an estimated net worth of $7.8 billion.

Intuit spent $3.7 million on federal lobbying in 2024, more than it has ever spent in a single year, primarily to kill the IRS Direct File program. For over 20 years, Intuit has waged a sophisticated campaign to prevent the government from creating a free filing system. In Q1 2025, Intuit paid $30,000 to lobby DOGE Caucus members on 'tax simplification.' In April 2025, the Trump administration announced plans to eliminate Direct File.

UK FCA fined Wise CEO Kristo Käärmann £350,000 for failing to disclose his inclusion on HMRC's deliberate tax defaulters list. Käärmann failed to pay £720,495 in capital gains tax from a 2017 share sale and was separately fined £365,651 by HMRC. The FCA found his approach 'careless rather than deliberate' but his failure to disclose prevented assessment of his fitness for senior management roles.

Revolut CEO and co-founder Nik Storonsky officially changed tax residency from UK to United Arab Emirates in October 2024 according to Companies House filings. Move could save him more than £3 billion in UK capital gains tax. Storonsky had been critical of UK's 'extreme bureaucracy' and regulatory landscape. Changed residence from England on October 16, 2024.

Rockstar North has claimed over £433 million in UK Video Games Tax Relief since the scheme began, despite paying £0 in corporation tax between 2009-2019 according to TaxWatch UK. In 2024, the company claimed £73m in tax relief while simultaneously paying £132m in dividends to Take-Two Interactive in the US. TaxWatch director George Turner called it 'a drive-by assault on the British taxpayer,' noting the relief was designed for small studios with cultural content, not billion-dollar franchises like GTA.

ProPublica's 2021 'Secret IRS Files' investigation revealed that Jeff Bezos paid zero in federal income taxes in 2007 and 2011 despite his fortune growing by billions. In 2011, with wealth of $18 billion, Bezos reported a net loss and claimed a $4,000 child tax credit. His long-term strategy of taking minimal salary ($80,000/year) while borrowing against stock avoided income tax on appreciation. In 2024, when he sold $13.6 billion in Amazon stock, his effective annual tax rate was approximately 2.5%. Between 2006 and 2018, Bezos paid $1.4 billion in federal taxes while his wealth increased by $127 billion.

In March 2021, Haugen moved to Puerto Rico to join 'crypto friends' on the island. Under Act 22, Puerto Rico residents who live there at least half the year are exempt from taxes on capital gains. Haugen stated 'I did buy crypto at the right time' when asked how she supported herself. Critics noted the irony of calling for tech companies to fulfill social duties while living in a tax haven in a U.S. territory with high poverty rates.

Kristo Käärmann was fined by HM Revenue & Customs for deliberately failing to notify them of a capital gains tax liability after selling shares worth approximately £10 million in September 2017. Despite multiple HMRC communications in 2019 and 2020, he failed to respond. He was added to HMRC's public tax defaulters list in September 2021. The fine was for either intentionally submitting incorrect documents or deliberately failing to provide correct information.

For fiscal year 2018, Amazon reported $11.2 billion in US pre-tax income but paid an effective federal income tax rate of -1%, receiving a $129 million federal tax refund. The previous year (2017), Amazon paid $0 on $5.6 billion profit. The company's tax strategies included use of R&D tax credits, stock-based compensation deductions, and other provisions. The Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy reported that Amazon had paid an effective federal tax rate of just 3.4% over the prior decade on cumulative profits of $26.5 billion.