Paris (AFP)

The 137 countries negotiating under the aegis of the OECD have failed to find an agreement so that large digital companies "pay their fair share of taxes", at the risk of relaunching the "trade war" in the midst of a pandemic.

"The glass is half full: the package is almost ready but a political agreement is missing," Pascal Saint-Amans, head of fiscal policy at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, admitted Monday.

While the OECD is confident that it will succeed by mid-2021, its Secretary General Angel Gurria has predicted, in the event of definitive failure, "an increase in unilateral actions, retaliatory measures", and in fine, a new "trade war".

While these new tax rules, in addition to pacifying international economic relations, could bring in 200 billion dollars a year, welcome as the pandemic has "widened the public deficits", argued Mr. Gurria at a conference of hurry.

Opposite, the digital giants have "taken advantage" of the digitization of the economy, accelerated by the various containment measures in the world.

In the meantime, the 137 countries participating in the negotiations have defined the overall framework of this reform.

Objective: that "large profitable companies doing an international activity pay their fair share of tax in the jurisdiction where they make profits", and not only, as is the case until now, in the country where they have their "permanent establishment".

For example, Facebook achieved a turnover of nearly 70 billion dollars in 2019, but paid 8.46 million euros in corporate tax in France in 2019. A tiny part of the 6 , 3 billion in taxes paid by the group, mainly in the United States.

To counter tax competition, the reform also provides for the establishment of a minimum global tax rate, which could be set at 12.5%.

This roadmap will be presented on Wednesday to the finance ministers of the G20 countries, which gave the OECD mandate in 2018 to reform, at the latest before the end of 2020, an international tax system rendered obsolete by the emergence of the GAFA ( acronym for Google, Amazon, Facebook and Apple).

The complex process was launched in 2013.

- "huge step forward" -

On the European side, we tried Monday to also see the "glass half full".

"The work carried out at the technical level constitutes a solid basis for finally having a political decision", welcomed the French Minister of the Economy Bruno Le Maire, while his German counterpart Olaf Scholz sees in this agreement on the main principles " a huge step forward ".

On the contrary, criticizing proposals that "fall short", the Independent Commission for the Reform of International Corporate Taxation (ICRICT), a think tank bringing together top jurists and economists, called on countries to take no expect "unilateral measures" which would at least have the advantage of "promoting higher revenues as long as broader reforms are blocked by the main members of the OECD".

Starting with the United States, which suspended its participation in these discussions until the presidential election on November 3.

But once this deadline has passed, and even with a new administration, nothing says that Washington will side with the international solution.

Faced with the American blockade, France adopted a tax on digital giants, which has already been levied in 2019, but had agreed to suspend the payment of down payments due in 2020 to give the OECD process a chance, and appease Washington, which threatens commercial retaliation.

But in the absence of agreement, the deposit on the 2020 tax will be taken by the end of the year, and the balance will have to be paid in early 2021, the Ministry of Finance is told.

It remains to be seen whether the European Union can make a difference.

At their last summit in July, the 27 asked the European Commission to present a proposal for a "digital license fee" during the first half of 2021.

A complex project, however, given the very divergent tax strategies of the Member States in digital matters.

© 2020 AFP