This includes Netflix’s offices in France and the Netherlands.
According to the news magazine Marianne and the daily newspaper Libération (via Deadline), on Tuesday, French authorities raided Netflix’s offices in France — as part of an investigation into alleged tax fraud that began in early 2022.
Inconsistencies were allegedly found in the tax returns of Netflix’s French subsidiary for 2019-2020 — the reported income did not match the expected financial revenues from 7 million subscribers at the time (and, accordingly, the taxes paid were lower).
According to Marianne, Netflix Services France paid $1.06 million (EUR 981,000) in income taxes for the 2019-20 fiscal year. The purpose of the investigation is to find out how the alleged tax fraud was carried out within the company.
Meanwhile, the Liberation newspaper writes that the searches were conducted simultaneously at Netflix’s European headquarters in the Netherlands «after months of cooperation between French and Dutch investigators».
It is worth noting that Netflix is not the first multinational company to be investigated in France for a fraudulent taxation scheme. In 2022, McDonald’s agreed to pay $1.36 billion (€1.25 billion) to the country to avoid criminal prosecution.