Tax Advisory

Structuring for growth, restructures

A commercial decision or pathway you take today can have a myriad of tax consequences in the future. The difficulty is knowing how to deliver on the commercial needs of your business in a way that minimises tax risk and maximises tax advantages and incentives - now and in the future.

Hayes Knight are specialists in structuring and restructuring for established, family, complex and growth businesses.

Identifying the right structure from the outset and across the lifecycle of the business
Maximising returns for business owners
Managing capital gains - small business CGT concessions, rollover relief, etc.,
Tax consolidation to achieve tax efficiency for a business group
Designing incentives for employees
Exit and divestment strategy and planning
Pre-sale or pre-investment planning

Working with you, we help identify potential problems before they occur and deliver a secure way to ‘test check’ your thinking with independent and commercially astute advice.

When a decision is made to buy, sell or merge a business, the tax consequences need to be planned and managed to ensure that they are aligned to your commercial goals - because you can’t unwind poor planning after the event.

Buying

The priority when buying a business is the structure that should be used to serve your commercial priorities in a way that promotes tax efficiency and reinforces asset protection. We look across these priorities to clarify your options and create the best possible position for now and the future.

Selling

Planning can make a dramatic difference to your outcome when you are contemplating selling a business. We can work with you to navigate the sale structure, manage the tax consequences, and ensure that where available, you maximise the tax concessions available to you.

Merging

We work with you to place the merged entityin the best possible position for the future.

Reducing the friction of cross border operations and transactions requires knowledge and experience.

Australia’s tax rules are complex, particularly in their treatment of business and investors likely to move money across borders. Hayes Knight excels at managing complexity and providing certainty.

We work with you to align your needs to the domestic and international regulatory requirements applicable to your specific scenario - we help you understand what's possible, and what's not.

Foreign businesses establishing in Australia
Australian businesses expanding offshore
Managing projects and teams across borders
Managing investments across borders
Assessing the viability of an international business proposal

A few common problem areas:

Tax residency of offshore subsidiaries – understanding where and how the subsidiary is taxed (it’s never as simple as it sounds).
Transfer pricing – requires commercial dealings between related entities indifferent countries are at arm’s length. This is more than getting it right; you need to have the documentation to prove it.
ControlledForeign Company (CFC) – The CFC rules can tax Australian shareholders on profits made by a foreign company, even before any dividends have been paid.
Transfer of funds from foreign trusts – funds transferred from overseas trusts can trigger unintended tax consequences.
Foreign residents sellingAustralian assets – strict rules can apply to taxableAustralian property regardless of the value.

Individual tax residency

Residency for tax purposes is not the same as what your visa says – you can be a tax resident of Australia and your worldwide income taxable under Australian law, without being a citizen or permanent resident.

Your tax status as either an Australian tax resident, foreign tax resident or temporary resident determines how you are taxed, the particular forms of income subject to tax in Australia, and your access to concessions.

Complicating matters is that there is no single ‘bright line’ test for residency. Determining tax residency often requires a review of your individual situation against a series of tests.

The Hayes Knight tax advice team can help provide certainty and clarify how Australian tax laws are likely to apply to you.

Understanding how the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) is likely to apply the tax laws to your specific situation can be opaque and frustrating. Hayes Knight’s tax advice team can help you achieve clarity and certainty through:

A private binding ruling (PBR) – a PBR provides a level of certainty and protection by binding the ATO to how they will apply the tax laws to your specific arrangement. We work with you to identify whether a PBR is viable and manage the application process through to resolution.
Objections - where taxpayers believe the ATO has not applied the tax laws equitably and fairly to an assessment, they have a right to lodge an objection to have their assessment reviewed. We manage the process for you from identification of the issues, evidence gathering, forming and lodging the opinion, through to a resolution.