Tax havens and sports clubs

Question for written answer  E-001085/2021
to the Commission
Rule 138
Ernest Urtasun (Verts/ALE)

According to information published by InfoLibre, which comes from new Football Leaks documents shared by Der Spiegel with the European Investigative Collaborations consortium, two companies based in the Cayman Islands and housed in a building in George Town where there are thousands of domiciled companies facilitated a payment to Real Madrid Football Club. That payment amounts to EUR 200 million and comes from a company in Luxembourg with social capital of EUR 20 000. According to the State of Tax Justice report, the Cayman Islands is the jurisdiction responsible for the largest tax losses in the world, despite which the Council removed it from the blacklist in 2020.

Does the Commission intend to investigate the financial operations of large sports clubs in non-cooperative jurisdictions?

Does the Commission share Parliament’s view that the Cayman Islands have not undertaken sufficient reforms to be removed from the blacklist of tax havens?

Does the Commission intend to intervene in reforming the blacklisting process in the light of failures such as that demonstrated by this scandal?