With U.S. corporate tax rates among the highest in the world, U.S.-based companies with international operations regularly look for structuring opportunities to reduce the exposure of their overseas earnings to U.S. taxes. A recent trend driving deal activity is the prevalence of acquisition-related inversions whereby the acquiring company redomiciles to a lower-tax jurisdiction concurrently with completing the transaction. While not the exclusive driver, a significant benefit of these inversions is reducing the future tax exposure of the combined company. The tax rules applicable to these inversion transactions are inherently complex and situation-specific. Below, we outline some of the very general principles, as well as some of the opportunities and challenges presented by these transactions.

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