It’s a sovereignty issue’: Bermuda digs in against global tax deal

It’s a sovereignty issue’: Bermuda digs in against global tax deal

Bermuda's political and business elite is responding to the G7 push for a minimum corporate income tax as it would to the approach of an Atlantic hurricane. Officials are looking to ride out the storm “” and keep intact a 19th-century revenue regime that leaves company profits untouched.

In an interview with the Financial Times, Curtis Dickinson, Bermuda's finance minister, said he was loath to introduce new levies while the island tax haven of about 64,000 people was still struggling to recover from both the Covid-19 pandemic and the financial crisis of 2008.

"Bermuda has a right to determine for itself what it thinks is an appropriate tax system for its jurisdiction,“ he said.

"We have a system in place for 200 years. It's not perfect. It does require some adjustment. But we would like to do that on our own and not have someone tell us to change our system to fit some global initiative“‰.“‰.“‰. I would say it's a sovereignty issue.“

Taxing corporate profits would make Bermuda more bureaucratic and add complexity for business, Dickinson said, threatening its role as a global hub for reinsurance, the cover that insurance companies buy to protect themselves against claims arising from hurricanes, wildfires and other