07/04/2016 World Business Report

Now for the latest financial news with

The fierce debate over tax havens and are they part of the cause

Plus: Back online - profits are finally on the up again

We'll find out what's been recharging its batteries.

Stephen tells me I've got far too long! Here is the deal, you give me

nine minutes and I will give you an exciting and fascinating snapshot of

all the latest in the world of business and money.

We will be hearing from superstar economist

We start with the ongoing global debate over tax havens.

The release of the Panama Papers has shone

an uncomfortable spotlight on other international financial centres and

Singapore has been tipped to overtake Switzerland

as the top spot for wealthy people looking to open an offshore account,

Big international companies have also rushed to minimise

their tax liabilities by setting up shop in places like Singapore.

It's perfectly legal, but that doesn't mean it's not controversial

For instance, income tax in Singapore is capped

at just 20% and that's only for money earned in Singapore.

Income earned abroad is taxed at this - zero.

In Singapore, companies pay just 17% tax on their profits

and none at all on money made abroad, if certain conditions

Now compare that to Australia, where the corporate tax rate is 30%

and 35% in the US, given that it's easy to see why big

firms from those countries channel billions of dollars of earnings

Here's our Asia Business correspondent Karishma Vaswani.

Setting up an offshore account is perfectly legal. In fact, in some

parts of Asia it is as easy as plugging in a few details into your

laptop and it will only take you a couple of hours. Pretty simple. But

here is where it gets complicated. There a difference between tax

evasion tax avoidance. Someone who has income to report and doesn't

report it, that illegal. But tax avoidance is different. If you have

found a loophole in the tax system which takes advantage of provisions

to avoid paying -- paying tax, well then depending on the country you

are in you may not be doing anything illegal. But we're not just talking

about people here. Companies do it as well. Google, Apple, Microsoft,

BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto, all household names and all have

admitted recently to being under order to buy the Australian tax

authorities for having their services and might -- marketing hubs

that up in Singapore. So, less tax than in Australia. What they say

they aren't doing anything wrong and that Singapore is an important hub

for them. At Australia says that if you make money in Australia you

should be paying taxes there as well. Singapore has a series of you

on tax evasion and doesn't tolerate tax related crimes. Hong Kong has

chimed in as well. In fact, many Asian countries ever have signed up

to a commitment to exchange tax information with each other by 2018.

-- more tax information. But frankly it is all about who goes first. If

one offshore banking centre opens itself up to greater scrutiny

there's a good chance customers will flee, chasing the next most secret

place to park their cash. She was shrouded in the dark! Let's get

another view. French economist Thomas Piketty

is famous for highlighting the growing gap between rich

and poor in his 2013 book Capital He has been speaking to

our economics editor Kamal Ahmed, telling him the world won't be able

to stop rising inequality without I believe in markets, but I think we

need strong institutions, we need more financial transparency and more

public knowledge about who is benefiting from growth in order to

adjust our policy, our tax policy, social policy, educational

policies, so as to make sure that growth does not only benefit a small

group of global elites but benefits the middle class and the poor and

all of society. Recent evidence from the Institute for Fiscal Studies

suggests that income inequality has reduced since the recession. Do you

think that's right? If you compare it to the 1980s and 70s with today,

20 or 30 years, not only the US but also the UK and most developed

countries, we've had rising inequality. Also if you were to look

at wealth inequality you will see a definite rise of concentration of

property in a country like the UK. I think it is clear when you have the

kind of real estate prices that you have in London, it means access to

property for working families, with no initial family rent, is

incredibly difficult. What do you think are the economic threats now?

To me the main problem with rising inequality in the long run if there

is a risk that it leads to a political instability, in some cases

to the rise of nationalism. When you don't manage to solve your local, --

local and domestic inequality in a peaceful manner, it is always

tempting to blame others. So you can blame foreign workers, like the

extreme right in France, you can blame foreign countries or Europe in

some cases, you can blame... In France we like to blame Germany or

China, Britain, people like to blame Europe, but the point is this is not

going to solve the problem. We are also looking at South Korean

tech giant Samsung. It's predicting a rise in operating

profits of more than 10% for It expects to make $5.72 billion

in the quarter, way above analyst expectations,

pointing to strong sales It would be a return to profit

growth for the struggling smartphone division after a tough three years,

amid growing competition from Apple, Satish Lele is a Vice President

at research firm Frost Sullivan. Great to have you on the programme.

It has been a very interesting ride for Samsung. I guess like Apple

Samsung has been a victim of its own success. If people out there wanted

a son that probably already had one, right? -- Samsung. In some cases it

is an upgrade to the next version, but if you look at the overall

growth of the smartphone market think globally that growth is more

single digit growth, which again as you can see puts a lot of pressure

on companies like Apple and Samsung. On that subject, we keep hearing or

I keep reading that the key for these companies to sustain growth is

to gain market share. I guess that's what Samsung has been doing

certainly with China and most recently India. Yes, with India I

think Samsung has really cracked it. They have a well structured strategy

for India and they are leading, as far as market share is concerned. It

is essentially based on the entire localisation efforts that they have

done, in terms of understanding the Indian market, in terms of the

penetration scene in the middle class and pricing their entire

product range in such a way that it is able to maintain that kind of

market share in India. I think it has been a very successful strategy.

Successful in that Indian strategy. We also recently heard that they've

just... Not long ago they launched Samsung pay in China. There's also

been a push on the next step in technology for these guys. Samsung

looking at virtual reality, augmented reality. That's the way

going forward, I guess? Yes. It tends to move away from hardware and

moving more towards how it can provide more experience to

consumers, as well as provide a whole gamut of services around the

mobile business. Things like virtual reality, all of these things are the

new areas that the unsung is really trying to move into in terms of its

ability to gain more and more revenues. -- Samsung. Thank you very

much. I just want to quickly show you the

markets in Asia. In particular the Nikkei is slightly up, but the yen

has risen to something like a 17 month peak. That's just trampled

Japanese exports. The stronger value yen makes it more expensive for us

to buy their goods, so we buy less and they make less, basically.

Don't forget you can get in touch with me and some

I will be back shortly to take a look at the papers from around the

world. One of the world's rarest

and most sought after books has been discovered in a private library

on the Scottish island of Bute. The First Folio of

William Shakespeare, published