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Taxes, Institutions and Foreign Diversification Opportunities

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Author Info
Mihir A. Desai () (Harvard University and NBER)
Dhammika Dharmapala () (University of Connecticut)

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Abstract

Investors can access foreign diversification opportunities through either foreign portfolio investment (FPI) or foreign direct investment (FDI). The worldwide tax regime employed by the U.S. potentially distorts this choice by penalizing FDI, relative to FPI, in low-tax countries. On the other hand, weak investor protections in foreign countries may increase the value of control, creating an incentive to use FDI rather than FPI. By combining data on US outbound FPI and FDI, this paper analyzes whether the composition of US outbound capital flows reflects these incentives to bypass home and host country institutional regimes. The results suggest that the residual tax on US multinational firms’ foreign earnings skews the composition of outbound capital flows - a 10% decrease in a foreign country’s corporate tax rate increases US investors’ equity FPI holdings by approximately 10%, controlling for effects on FDI. Investor protections also seem to shape portfolio choices, though these results are not robust when only withincountry variation is employed.

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Paper provided by Oxford University Centre for Business Taxation in its series Working Papers with number 0828.

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Date of creation: 2008
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Handle: RePEc:btx:wpaper:0828

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Related research
Keywords: Foreign Portfolio Investment; Foreign Direct Investment; Taxes; Investor Protections;

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
F21 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - International Investment; Long-Term Capital Movements
F23 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - Multinational Firms; International Business
G30 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - General
H25 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Business Taxes and Subsidies

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References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
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    Other versions:
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  14. Pol Antràs & Mihir A. Desai & C. Fritz Foley, 2007. "Multinational Firms, FDI Flows and Imperfect Capital Markets," NBER Working Papers 12855, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Mihir A. Desai & Dhammika Dharmapala, 2007. "Taxes and Portfolio Choice: Evidence from JGTRRA's Treatment of International Dividends," NBER Working Papers 13281, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  2. Dhammika Dharmapala, 2008. "What Problems and Opportunities are Created by Tax Havens?," Working Papers 0820, Oxford University Centre for Business Taxation. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
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