Yesmoke Tobacco S.p.A.

The “Direzione Nazionale dell'Agenzia delle Entrate” (National Office of the Revenue Agency) overturns the judgment of the Regional Agencies granting to the foreigner, Logista, the privileges that belonged to the Italian State Monopoly, and condemning Italian manifacturers. But Yesmoke is watching and will denounce the scam.

The Italian State Monopoly, a subject that benefited from the “Monophase Value Added Tax” (IVA monofase) tax regime no longer exists. Law no. 76, dated 7 March 1985 is clear and the Revenue Agency of the Piemonte Region clarified any doubts. There is no need for the Direzione Centrale Normativa dell’Agenzia delle Entrate (Central Normative Office of the Revenue Agency) to interpret it: “The law is effective for processed tobaccos destined for sale to the public in the territory subject to monopoly”.

The Italian State Monopoly used to be the only distributor, producer and importer of processed tobaccos. Therefore, the VAT regime was “effectively monophase” and it could not be otherwise. Read more »

BAT Italia wants Yesmoke to declare in Yesmoke’s Blog that BAT has nothing to do with the evasion of Value Added Tax reported by Yesmoke. The correction, written by BAT, should be published with the Yesmoke signature.

But BAT cannot consider itself extraneous, because the law is quite clear: if invoices have to be issued with VAT, then whoever issues an invoice without VAT and whoever receives it are evading taxes.

The Blog is open to BAT; they are free to make their contribution to clarify an untenable position that is destabilizing the entire sector.

Is BAT holder of a VAT deposit? Has it paid the bond to exercise the VAT deposit or has it been exonerated? On its sales of processed tobacco produced in Italy, does it invoice to the distributor Logista with VAT? Read more »

The privileges that the Italian Monopoly enjoyed could be passed on to British American Tobacco when it acquired it;  However, this had to be planned and regulated by rules, not by underhand agreements that damage Yesmoke.

Circular 16D, of April 28th 2006, of the Customs Agency (Agenzia delle Dogane), though it is not a law, is an important opinion that should be followed.  As a circular, it clarifies existing legislation and therefore regulates the VAT deposits instituted both before the publication of the circular as well as those instituted after its issue. Read more »

On Wednesday, October 14th, Yesmoke received notification of the hearing, scheduled for the morning of Friday the 16th in Rome.

The public clarification requested from British America Tobacco in answer to its letter “reserved and confidential”, had arrived, but in the form of a recourse, with the request for the preventive removal of the news article published on October 1st: “BAT, 500 Million of Evaded VAT Discovered by Yesmoke”.

According to BAT, this text is “totally misleading as it attributes absolutely unfounded facts to British American Tobacco Italia".

But what was the sense of a petition to the court? The sentence was already there: it was the opinion of the Revenue Agency - Agenzia delle Entrate, interpellated by Yesmoke.

BAT claimed that the non-payment of VAT by Logista Italia follows, in this case, correct procedures. But this is the exact opposite from what the Revenue Agency affirms. Read more »

A private company substitutes the State and discovers another of the countless violations, Italian style, worthy of the Guinness Book of Records.

The Autonomous Administration of the State Monopolies (Amministrazione Autonoma dei Monopoli di Stato) did not correctly regulate the privatization of the processed tobacco distribution sector.

This failure, besides favoring the de facto monopoly of the distributor, Logista Italia S.p.A. owned by a multinational, determined violations of the most elementary fiscal rules.

And considering that Giorgio Tino, director of the AAMS, was a member of Logista’s board of directors … How could they have made such a mistake? Read more »

If one leaves an unpaid bill that could enter the Guinness Book of Records, you would expect that someone would try to make him pay up,  but instead…

Giovanni Giorgetti, director of the “Centro Studi Economico e Finanziario ESG89”

After a study, conducted by the  Economic and Financial Studies Center «Centro Studi Economico e Finanziario ESG89», of the balances of over 800 capital companies operating in the agricultural sector, Philip Morris, with the sum of 1,450,167,854.00 euro, was ranked “first for turnover among all the companies operating at a national level”.

A prestigious result, that is to be expected from a top-class company!  But what has Philip Morris got to do with Italian agriculture? Read more »

«Fellows, you haven’t understood anything: we lost the war and if Big Tobacco doesn’t pay taxes in Italy as it should, there’s nothing strange about it” - say the experts.

But Japan didn’t win the war either, because it was part of the  ROBERTO (the Rome, Berlin Tokyo axis). An Italian  taxpayer who buys a pack of Camels should know that Japan Tobacco  does not pay a single cent of tax on the profits earned from his purchase, and it is pocketing the money.

How much would Yesmoke Tobacco S.p.A. have to report to the Italian tax office if it sold 800 million packs of cigarettes, as JTI - Japan Tobacco International Italia - does in one year?

At an average price of 3.90 euro – JTI's average sales price for its cigarettes (going from Winstons at 3.70 to Camels at 4.00 euro), Yesmoke would have to declare a profit of 376 million euro. Read more »