Category: Press Releases and Statements

Australian Software Royalty Ruling Runs Counter to International Tax Norms

Posted on by Veronica Berkshire

WASHINGTON, D.C. – National Foreign Trade Council (NFTC) Vice President for International Tax Policy Anne Gordon issued a statement following the Australian government’s decision to finalize the Software Royalty Ruling (TR 2026/2):

“We are extremely concerned that the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) has decided to double down on its unprincipled approach to routine business transactions. This guidance continues to run counter to international tax norms, including unilaterally reinterpreting the U.S.- Australia Tax Treaty.

“Moving forward with this ruling ignores recent Australian case law and further erodes investor confidence as well as the overall business climate in the country.

“Given widespread pushback and the litany of issues, we urge the ATO to reconsider this approach.”

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About the NFTC
The National Foreign Trade Council (NFTC) is the premier business association advancing trade, tax, national security, and supply chain policies that support access to the global marketplace. Founded in 1914, NFTC promotes an open, rules-based global economy on behalf of a diverse membership of U.S.-based businesses, who account for over $6 trillion in revenue and employ nearly 6 million people in the United States.

NFTC Encourages the U.S. and Canada to Return to the Table

Posted on by Veronica Berkshire

WASHINGTON, D.C. – National Foreign Trade Council (NFTC) Senior Director for Trade and Innovation Brad Wood today issued the following statement following the breakdown of talks between the United States and Canada:

“We are profoundly disappointed that the encouraging momentum that the U.S. and Canada had announced early last week fell apart at the 11th hour. The imposition of a new round of tariffs, the announcement of future tariffs by the United States, along with Canada’s announced retaliation, emphasize exactly what is at stake.

“The reality is that the United States and Canada have highly interconnected and mutually beneficial economies. Businesses of all sizes on both sides of the border rely on this trade and would benefit from their governments’ ability to reach an agreement.

“We urge negotiators not to let this moment give way to sustained frustration, and instead prioritize and continue their work to deliver a bilateral framework that protects industries and builds toward the renewal of USMCA. Both Canada and the U.S. are stronger as part of an integrated North American manufacturing platform that boosts our mutual competitiveness globally.”

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About the NFTC
The National Foreign Trade Council (NFTC) is the premier business association advancing trade, tax, national security, and supply chain policies that support access to the global marketplace. Founded in 1914, NFTC promotes an open, rules-based global economy on behalf of a diverse membership of U.S.-based businesses, who account for over $6 trillion in revenue and employ nearly 6 million people in the United States.

NFTC Regrets Introduction of News Bargaining Legislation in Australia

Posted on by Marshall Lane

WASHINGTON, D.C. – National Foreign Trade Council (NFTC) Vice President for Global Trade Policy Tiffany Smith issued the following statement following the Australian government’s introduction yesterday of legislation to establish the News Media Bargaining Incentive:

“We regret that Prime Minister Albanese’s government has decided to push forward and introduce the News Media Bargaining Charge Bill 2026 to codify the news bargaining agreement.

“As we have stated repeatedly, this policy, akin to a digital services tax, unfairly and discriminatorily targets just a handful of our country’s most dynamic companies.

“We urge the Trump administration to engage the Australian government on this and other domestic policies that are hampering American companies’ ability to do business in the Australian market.”

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About the NFTC

The National Foreign Trade Council (NFTC) is the premier business association advancing trade, tax, national security, and supply chain policies that support access to the global marketplace. Founded in 1914, NFTC promotes an open, rules-based global economy on behalf of a diverse membership of U.S.-based businesses, who account for over $6 trillion in revenue and employ nearly 6 million people in the United States.

NFTC Urges Continued U.S., EU Negotiations

Posted on by Veronica Berkshire

WASHINGTON, D.C. – National Foreign Trade Council (NFTC) Vice President for Global Trade Policy Tiffany Smith issued the following statement:

“Last week’s statements from the President and Ambassador Greer show the Administration is losing patience with the EU’s one-step forward, two-steps back approach to the bilateral relationship.

“These are not idle threats, and we strongly support the Administration’s willingness to push back against the EU’s aggressive overregulation of leading U.S. digital companies. Beyond the urgent digital issues that triggered these announcements, we still need to see meaningful progress on other problematic issues, including digital services taxes, the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CS3D), and the Deforestation Regulation.

“We urge the EU to negotiate meaningful outcomes with the U.S. that will preserve this important bilateral relationship.”

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About the NFTC
The National Foreign Trade Council (NFTC) is the premier business association advancing trade, tax, national security, and supply chain policies that support access to the global marketplace. Founded in 1914, NFTC promotes an open, rules-based global economy on behalf of a diverse membership of U.S.-based businesses, who account for over $6 trillion in revenue and employ nearly 6 million people in the United States.

Graham Sanctions Bill Would Create Unprecedented Expansion of Presidential Tariff Authority

Posted on by Veronica Berkshire

WASHINGTON, D.C. – National Foreign Trade Council (NFTC) President Jake Colvin today issued a statement as the Senate considers “The Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia” (S. 5205) bill.

“The NFTC recognizes the need to enhance the United States’ ability to impose and enforce meaningful sanctions against Russia and the countries that support its aggression against Ukraine. However, authorizing the use of tariffs to penalize sanctions evasion would be an unprecedented expansion of tariff authority and conflates two very different concepts. Such a move would expand both trade and national security authorities, and enable the Executive Branch to impose broad tariffs on America’s allies and major trading partners disguised as targeted sanctions.

“Given the Administration’s history of using national security as a pretext for imposing new tariffs, rushing to give the President additional unchecked tariff authority to use against America’s allies without adequate guardrails is a surprising choice.

“Congressional leaders ought to consider the long-term effects of the sanctions legislation they seem ready to ram through. Yesterday, the President used a nearly 100-year-old statute for the first time to impose tariffs on Canada. Once Congress delegates an authority, it is nearly impossible to claw it back or control its use.

“We urge Congress not to sleepwalk through this process. Congressional leadership should revisit the tariff provisions in the bill, decouple them from sanctions enforcement measures, and include guardrails and best practices that preserve Congressional authority.”

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About the NFTC
The National Foreign Trade Council (NFTC) is the premier business association advancing trade, tax, national security, and supply chain policies that support access to the global marketplace. Founded in 1914, NFTC promotes an open, rules-based global economy on behalf of a diverse membership of U.S.-based businesses, who account for over $6 trillion in revenue and employ nearly 6 million people in the United States.

USMCA is Critical to American Competitiveness

Posted on by Veronica Berkshire

WASHINGTON, D.C. – National Foreign Trade Council (NFTC) Senior Director for Trade and Innovation Brad Wood today issued the following statement, on the date of the first United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) Joint Review:

“The integrated North American marketplace created by USMCA is the bedrock of U.S. competitiveness, delivering affordable domestic manufacturing and enabling American firms to compete and win in global markets.

“As negotiations continue beyond today’s formal review date, the NFTC urges all three governments to work trilaterally to address the remaining barriers and prioritize renewal of the agreement to restore the stability, predictability, and rules-based framework that the USMCA provides to U.S. businesses, workers, and consumers.”

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About the NFTC
The National Foreign Trade Council (NFTC) is the premier business association advancing trade, tax, national security, and supply chain policies that support access to the global marketplace. Founded in 1914, NFTC promotes an open, rules-based global economy on behalf of a diverse membership of U.S.-based businesses, who account for over $6 trillion in revenue and employ nearly 6 million people in the United States.

NFTC Cautions Utility of Public CbCR Reports

Posted on by Veronica Berkshire

Today, the first Public Country-by-Country reports are due in Australia and Europe for fiscal year taxpayers with a June 30 year-end. Calendar-year taxpayers will submit reports by December 31, 2026. These reports are separate from confidential Country-by-Country reports, which companies have submitted to tax authorities for several years.

While both the Australian and European regimes aim to increase transparency, they are based on different legal frameworks and reporting rules that limit comparability. The starting point for each of these reports is financial accounting data, but there are several differences and required adjustments that could lead to misinterpretations about the actual economic activity occurring in a particular country. For example, reported revenue amounts may double count intra-company sales common in complex multinational supply chains, leading to artificially inflated revenues. Country-by-Country reports also do not take into account routine tax outcomes, such as refunds from prior-year overpayments, audit adjustments, or the use of loss carryforwards, which may create volatility in reported tax paid that does not reflect current-year activity.

Furthermore, these reports do not reconcile with U.S. financial reporting, which uses other standards and rules. As a result, Country-by-Country reports may create confusion if viewed without the proper context. Accordingly, stakeholders, including lawmakers, should exercise caution when drawing conclusions based on comparing data across jurisdictions or to financial reporting metrics.

More Information

More details about Australia’s reporting requirements can be found here.

For more details about reporting in the European Union, please see EU Directive 2021/2101.

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About the NFTC
The National Foreign Trade Council (NFTC) is the premier business association advancing trade, tax, national security, and supply chain policies that support access to the global marketplace. Founded in 1914, NFTC promotes an open, rules-based global economy on behalf of a diverse membership of U.S.-based businesses, who account for over $6 trillion in revenue and employ nearly 6 million people in the United States.

NFTC Statement on EU DMA Decision

Posted on by Veronica Berkshire

WASHINGTON, D.C. – National Foreign Trade Council (NFTC) President Jake Colvin today issued a statement following the EU’s preliminary designation of two American cloud providers as gatekeepers under the European Union’s (EU) Digital Markets Act (DMA):

“The preliminary view announced by the European Commission that Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure (Azure) should be designated as gatekeepers under the DMA is yet another effort to target and disadvantage successful U.S. companies in the EU market.

“Moving ahead with this investigation even when DMA gatekeeper thresholds are not met is baffling and shows the Commission can simply hand-pick leading U.S. companies for regulation under the DMA whenever it chooses.

“Key issues raised by the Commission in this designation, such as the ability for cloud service clients to switch providers, data portability, and interoperability are already regulated by the EU Data Act.

“This designation will not just harm American companies by increasing costs and compliance burdens in the U.S., it will also negatively affect investment and innovation in Europe and EU customer’s access to these services.

“This decision – ironically announced on the same day EU member states approved tariff cuts under the U.S.-EU Joint Statement on reciprocal balanced trade – shows that there is still significant work to be done to ensure U.S. companies face a level playing field in Europe. We urge the administration to engage with the EU to prevent this unnecessary and discriminatory designation.”

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About the NFTC
The National Foreign Trade Council (NFTC) is the premier business association advancing trade, tax, national security, and supply chain policies that support access to the global marketplace. Founded in 1914, NFTC promotes an open, rules-based global economy on behalf of a diverse membership of U.S.-based businesses, who account for over $6 trillion in revenue and employ nearly 6 million people in the United States.

NFTC Statement on Customs Enforcement Executive Order

Posted on by Veronica Berkshire

WASHINGTON, D.C. – National Foreign Trade Council (NFTC) Vice President for Global Trade Policy Tiffany Smith today issued a statement on the administration’s “Strengthening Customs Enforcement” Executive Order:

“While we welcome the administration’s focus on strengthening supply chains and improving customs enforcement, those objectives must not come at the expense of facilitating low-risk, lawful trade. We are concerned that several provisions in the Executive Order may have unintended consequences that could harm trade facilitation efforts.

“The changes made by the E.O. will increase both the cost and complexity of importing goods into the United States. In particular, the new rules for foreign importers of record (IORs), including a prohibition on filing informal customs entries, will have an outsized effect on business-to-consumer e-commerce transactions where the seller is located abroad and the consumer is in the United States.

“In addition, the E.O. greatly restricts U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s (CBP) ability to use discretion in assessing penalties for customs violations by requiring CBP to require payment of at least 50% of any customs penalty, even for minor errors.

“These changes in combination will significantly increase demand for U.S. IORs, while also raising their exposure to enforcement risk, with the likely result being increased costs for IOR services, shortages of willing U.S. IORs, or both.

“To minimize the disruption of legitimate trade, we urge the administration to carefully consider these actions and to have an open and robust stakeholder input process, including notice-and-comment rulemaking.

“Customs enforcement is most successful when the private and public sectors work together, and the NFTC is ready to help the administration fulfill its goals and strengthen both trade facilitation and customs enforcement in a way that supports lawful trade for U.S. businesses of all sizes.”

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About the NFTC
The National Foreign Trade Council (NFTC) is the premier business association advancing trade, tax, national security, and supply chain policies that support access to the global marketplace. Founded in 1914, NFTC promotes an open, rules-based global economy on behalf of a diverse membership of U.S.-based businesses, who account for over $6 trillion in revenue and employ nearly 6 million people in the United States.