Ottawa — Canada scrapped its digital services tax (DST) targeting US technology firms late on Sunday, just hours before it was due to take effect, in a bid to advance stalled trade negotiations with the US.
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney and US President Donald Trump would resume trade negotiations to agree on a deal by July 21, Canada’s finance ministry said in a statement.
Trump abruptly called off trade talks on Friday over the tax targeting US technology firms, saying that it was a “blatant attack”.
He reiterated his comments on Sunday, pledging to set a new tariff rate on Canadian goods within the next week, which threatened to push US-Canada relations back into chaos after a period of relative calm.
The breakdown in trade talks comes after the two leaders met at the G7 in mid-June and Carney said they had agreed to wrap up a new economic agreement within 30 days.
Act to be rescinded
Canada’s planned digital tax was 3% of the digital services revenue a firm takes in from Canadian users above $20m in a calendar year, and payments were to be retroactive to 2022.
It would have affected US technology firms, including Amazon, Meta, Alphabet’s Google and Apple.
Monday collection would be halted, the Canada’s finance ministry statement said, and finance minister François-Philippe Champagne would bring forward legislation to rescind the Digital Services Tax Act.
“The DST was announced in 2020 to address the fact that many large technology companies operating in Canada may not otherwise pay tax on revenues generated from Canadians,” the statement said. “Canada’s preference has always been a multilateral agreement related to digital services taxation.”
Markets welcome move
Stock index futures rose after the news the tax would be rescinded and the bullish sentiment spilt over into Asian markets.
Canada is the second-largest US trading partner after Mexico, and the largest buyer of US exports. It bought $349.4bn of US goods last year and exported $412.7bn to the US, according to US Census Bureau data.
The Biden administration had requested trade dispute settlement consultations over the tax in 2024, saying it was inconsistent with Canada’s North American trade deal obligations.
Canada had escaped Trump’s broad tariffs imposed in April but faces 50% duties on steel and aluminium.
Reuters
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