On January 10, 2013, the Canada Revenue Agency released its 2011-2012 Advance Pricing Arrangement Program Report (previous reports are available here).

This is the eleventh year in which the CRA has issued such a report, which is generally intended to enhance taxpayer awareness of the APA program and to describe (i) current operational status, (ii) relevant changes, and (iii) issues that may affect the program in future years.

The general purpose of an APA is to create certainty between the taxing authorities of Canada and a foreign country concerning the transfer pricing of cross-border intercompany transactions. In the absence of an APA governing such transactions, taxpayers may be exposed to higher audit risk relating to their intercompany transfer pricing methodologies, which may ultimately result in costly and time-consuming negotiations with the multiple tax authorities as well as potential litigation. Accordingly, the CRA encourages taxpayers to avail themselves of the APA program to mitigate the transfer pricing risk in the appropriate circumstances, particularly where the taxpayer engages in intercompany transactions of a recurring nature (i.e., frequent sale of goods between affiliates or the ongoing provision of intercompany services).

The APA program has proven popular with taxpayers over the years and the number of applicants continues to grow – the 2011-2012 fiscal year had the highest number of applicants to the program (34) since the 2007-2008 fiscal year. The inventory of unresolved cases also continues to grow (the inventory increased from 96 at the end of the 2010-2011 fiscal year to 102 at the end of the 2011-2012 fiscal year).In the 2011-2012 fiscal year, 17 new cases were admitted to the APA program whereas only 10 cases were completed (and one was withdrawn).The large discrepancy between the number of applicants and the number of cases formally admitted to the program in the year is partially a reflection of the changes introduced by the CRA beginning in the 2010-2011 fiscal year requiring that taxpayers invest significantly more time and resources during the initial application/due diligence phase of the APA process and to provide a greater amount of financial and business information prior to acceptance into the program. This results in a longer and more extensive "screening" process but is intended to eliminate inappropriate cases before they are accepted into the program inventory.

Other highlights of the Report include:

  • The average amount of time required to conclude a bilateral APA from acceptance into the program until completion was 44 months, which appears generally consistent with prior years;
  • The majority of APA's relate to the cross-border transfer of tangible property. Approximately 47% of APA cases in process relate to tangible personal property whereas cases involving tangible personal property and intra-group services represent approximately 31% and 22% of cases in process;
  • The transactional net margin method ("TNMM") continues to be the most frequently used transfer pricing methodology in APA cases; and
  • APAs involving the United States represent approximately 71% of all APA cases that are in process (which is slightly lower than the percentage of completed APA cases that involve the United States).

For more information, visit our Canadian Tax Litigation blog at www.canadiantaxlitigation.com

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