Quote 2 of the day: shareholders, tax avoidance and refined sugar

A second quote of the day, this time from the Financial Times’ Lombard column, a musing on the current U.S. focused news about corporate inversions:

“Transactions sold on tax advantages should be sources of shareholder unease too. Governments can readily change their minds about corporate tax regimes (see above) and, more importantly, companies should be looking to industrial logic and more reliable financial benefits to justify M&A, not depending on tax wheezes to make the numbers stack up.”

Indeed. Or, as UK barrister David Quentin noted recently for TJN:

“Tax avoidance in companies is like refined sugar in the human body – empty financial calories with adverse long-term health effects.”