By Valentina Z and Emilio Parody
Rome, April 9 (Reuters) – Italy is demanding 1.2 billion euros ($ 1.3 billion) from the Italy Fintech Group ion, which was said by two people with knowledge of the case, after an investigation into the case by prosecutors in the northern city Bologna in the period 2013-2023.
The investigation adds a string of tax evasion cases in Italy, which targets US tech companies, which are also at the center of the widespread European Union’s response to the trade war provided by the administration of US President Donald Trump.
The ion group is a privately organized provider of financial services software and data located in Dublin and is accompanied by offices around the world, which was established by Andrea Pignataro, who is an Italian businessman from Bologna.
Ion has spent about 6 billion euros on a series of acquisitions in Italy in recent years as Pignataro works to create a hub to provide data and digital services to small banks.
One of the sources said that the Italian tax authority is demanding up to 500 million euros in the missing revenue from ion, which is more than the couple when the interest payment is added.
Ion’s lawyers are discussing with Italian tax authority to counter claims, the person said.
The allegations are a failure to file a tax return, the second source said, the prosecutors and the Tax police of Italy alleged in Bologna that the company announced the income abroad which was actually produced in Italy.
Reuters stated last month that Italy had submitted a demand for tax in an unprecedented VAT claim against the US Tech veterans to Mata, X and LinkedIn, which could have resulted the results during the European Union.
(Reporting by Valentina Z and Emilio Parody, edit by Giselda Vagnony)
