Japan demands 119 million dlrs in tax from Amazon: report

July 5, 2009

Japanese authorities told a sales affiliate of US retail giant Amazon.com to pay about 119 million dollars in tax for unreported income over a three-year period, a newspaper said Sunday.

Amazon Japan and Amazon Japan Logistics are responsible for operations here but the income has been reported in the United States by the company's Seattle-based affiliate -- Amazon.com International Sales, the Asahi Shimbun daily said.

The Tokyo tax bureau reportedly judged that the company should have paid tax in Japan for the income made in the country during the three years to 2005, the daily said.

Amazon has asked for the case to be negotiated between the Japanese and US tax authorities, saying the taxation was "inappropriate", the Asahi said.

Neither the tax authorities nor Amazon Japan were immediately available for comment.

(c) 2009 AFP

• Arikin - Jul 06, 2009
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  Except for high demand books stocked in Japan. A lot of them are shipped directly from Amazon USA. So those can't be taxed in Japan right?
  
  But did Amazon Japan purchase the stocked books from Amazon USA? Or only the ones that were actually sold? If they are just a logistic warehouse I would think that only the profit margin would be taxable.
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