[LINK] Australian Tax Office's Wikipedia bungle
Bernard Robertson-Dunn
brd at iimetro.com.au
Fri Dec 18 15:04:54 AEDT 2009
Australian Tax Office's Wikipedia bungle
The Australian
Malcolm Farr
From: The Daily Telegraph
December 18, 2009 1:01AM
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/australian-it/australian-tax-offices-wikipedia-bungle/story-e6frgakx-1225811713665
THE Australian Tax Office faces international embarrassment after it
used the online site Wikipedia as a source for a ruling affecting the
fate of hundreds of millions of dollars.
Wikipedia has been criticised for the quality of its information, but
the ATO trusted it enough to use it for a definition of the business
term "private equity".
The ATO has acknowledged it referred to the online information source
for the ruling, but denied it was a primary source.
A draft determination made on Wednesday said: "A key component of
private equity as an asset for institutional investors is that assets
are typically realised after some period of time, which will vary
depending on the investment strategy."
Wikipedia says: "A key component of private equity as an asset class for
institutional investors is that investments are typically realized after
some period of time, which will vary depending on the investment strategy."
The Wall Street Journal noted the lift and said: "At least they took the
time to Briticize it by changing Z's to S's."
Another passage on three factors related to private equity used terms
similar to those cited by Wikipedia. There was no direct attribution,
but the ATO ruling did advise: "See generally Wikipedia: Private Equity."
The private equity definition was used in the December 16 draft taxation
determination headed: "Income tax: Can a private equity entity make an
income gain from the disposal of the target assets it has acquired?"
The ATO tightened tax rules by declaring that profits from the sale of
assets by private equity firms could in some cases be dealt with as
taxable income.
This affected a bid by an investment business to move offshore some $1.5
billion gained from the float of Myers Holdings.
--
Regards
brd
Bernard Robertson-Dunn
Canberra Australia
brd at iimetro.com.au
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