Our tax system ensures that a company is not a personal bank account or cash box to be dipped into as and when required without tax implications (whether we understand them or not). In tough economic times, the temptation is to not pay close enough attention to the tax pitfalls in accessing wealth located within a company or a corporate structure. This presentation considers ten things you might want to know about liberating wealth from companies, including:
- can a trust make distributions of income to a company without ever transferring cash or property?
- can a company issue a dividend access share and bypass existing shareholders in distributing funds?
- can returns of capital be taxed as dividends?
- can private company groups ever demerge?