France to tax tech firms with sales over €750m

rate of five per cent is being considered for the new tax.

Taxing digital giants was one of Emmanuel Macron’s campaign promises in 2017, and Le Maire is tasked with seeing it through.

France is not the only country to have started working on a national tax on tech giants however. The UK, Italy and Spain have all announced similar measures in recent months.

Unified European action, which requires every EU member state to back the proposal, has proved difficult, however.

Ireland, where several technology giants are headquartered, stands to lose a large amount in taxes under the new plans.

Sweden, Denmark and Finland have also objected, saying taxes should be adopted only after the implementation of a global plan from the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

Many non-European countries have also shown an interest in taxing tech-giants, and the OECD, which includes 36 developed countries, has been working on fiscal policy solutions to tax virtual economic activity worldwide.

He said that Lebanon was split after Rafik Hariri’s assassination in 2005 but Lebanon decided not to interfere in regional conflicts despite some Lebanese parties’ involvement in the Syrian war, in an apparent reference to the pro-Iran