Tax Takes Center Stage at KPMG's EMEA Tax Summit

AMSTERDAM, June 28, 2011 /PRNewswire/ --

As the global economy begins to show signs of recovery, businesses around the world are seeking new ways to strengthen their balance sheets and stay competitive. At the same time, revenue authorities around the world continue to optimize the way in which they collect tax revenue. Changes and challenges for businesses are moving at a pace like never before making tax a top of mind issue.

In Amsterdam today and yesterday, over 600 senior tax professionals from over 40 countries met to discuss the increasing complexity and mounting challenges they are facing. One-on-one video interviews with KPMG firms' tax professionals providing in-depth insights from the Europe Middle East and Asia (EMEA) Tax Summit will be available at http://www.kpmg.com/taxviews.

Changes and challenges emphasized by KPMG's Tax professionals included:

• The need to stay on top of legislative changes being implemented by governments
• Time required to devote to an increasing number of tax disputes
• The increasing scrutiny of tax authorities as they work ever harder at maintaining revenue flows and attacking record-breaking deficits
• The added pressure of unprecedented levels of regulatory changes for industries like financial services that includes Basel III, the Dodd-Franck act, UCITS IV, and FATCA  
• Increased scrutiny in cross-border transfer pricing as countries ensure their fair share of the value chain is taxed in-country
• Dealing with the myriad of tax changes at the country, state and local levels with indirect taxes and environmental levies or tax incentives.

As companies become more global, tax complexity and risk increases exponentially, KPMG firms' professionals point out that tax and tax changes or challenges are a fact life for businesses now. It is essential that companies have not only tax projects to deal with the issues, but multidisciplinary projects where tax has a seat at the table and in the boardroom. Ultimately tax can contribute properly to the debate and help tax professionals and their companies achieve their goals.

For more information (RC) please visit http://www.kpmg.com/taxviews

About KPMG (RC)

KPMG is a global network of professional firms providing Audit, Tax, and Advisory services.  We operate in 150 countries and have 138,000 people working in member firms around the world.  The independent member firms of the KPMG network are affiliated with KPMG International Cooperative ("KPMG International"), a Swiss entity.  Each KPMG firm is a legally distinct and separate entity and describes itself as such.

James Bigg, Edelman, Tel: +1-416-849-2496, Email: james.bigg@edelman.com