Corporate tax transparency population
This year's Corporate tax transparency report analyses aggregated data from the 2023–24 income tax returns of some of the largest corporations operating in Australia. It describes changes and trends in key headline figures for the population, as well as data by industry segment and ownership group.
The Corporate tax transparency population includes:
- any corporate tax entity with a total income equal to or exceeding $100 million
- entities that have petroleum resource rent tax (PRRT) payable.
Note: For income years up to 2021–22, the total income threshold for Australian-owned private companies was $200 million or more.
Legislation specifies the type of information we are required to report on. In producing this report – for corporations that meet the population income threshold – we take the data from 3 labels in the tax return:
- total income
- taxable income
- tax payable.
Note: Data in the Corporate tax transparency report is taken directly from tax returns at a certain point in time and does not reflect any intervention or compliance work after lodgment of the returns (including settlement outcomes).
Corporations can also publish their own reports about their tax positions through the Voluntary Tax Transparency Code.
Highlights for 2023–24
- There was an increase in the number of entities with total income greater than $100 million.
- There are 4,110 entities in this year's population, representing a net increase of 125 entities (3.1%).
- The aggregate results show another year of strong results for the population, with tax payable being the second highest total ever recorded.
- Total income for 2023–24 was $3,278.8 billion, an increase of 4.5%.
- Taxable income was $365.5 billion, a decrease of 3.8%.
- Tax payable was $95.7 billion, a decrease of 2.3%.
- Australian public and private entities make up 58% of the corporate tax transparency population and contribute 61% of tax payable.
- Foreign-owned entities accounted for 41.7% of this year's corporate transparency population and 39.0% of tax payable.
- Australian public entities accounted for 14.2% of this year's corporate transparency population and 48.1 % of tax payable.
- Australian private entities accounted for 44.2% of this year's corporate transparency population and 13.0% of tax payable.
- Tax payable continues to be highly concentrated in a small number of large entities.
- Entities with income of more than $5 billion represented 2.3% of the corporate transparency population and accounted for 59.3% of tax payable ($56.8 billion).
- Entities with income of between $250 million and $5 billion represented 43.3% of the corporate transparency population and accounted for 33.5% of the tax payable ($32.1 billion).
- Entities with income of less than $250 million – represented the largest portion (54.4%) of the corporate transparency population but accounted for only 7.2% of the tax payable ($6.9 billion).
- Despite being the only segment to decline in tax payable for 2023–24, the Mining, Energy and Water segment continues to be the most significant contributor to tax payable.
- Around half of tax payable in the corporate transparency population was paid by the Mining, Energy and Water segment at 50.6% ($48.5 billion) of the total.
- This year all segments apart from Mining, Energy and Water had increased tax payable compared to the previous year.
- The number of nil taxpayers continues to decline.
- Approximately 28% of entities paid nil tax. This is the lowest proportion of nil tax entities in eleven years of CTT reporting.
- Of the 28% paying nil tax, the reasons were:
- incurred an accounting loss (13%)
- incurred a tax loss (4%)
- utilised offsets (2%)
- utilised tax losses from previous years (9%).
- The introduction of the PRRT deductions has resulted in more taxpayers paying PRRT, but overall collections are down.
- The number of PRRT payers increased from 11 to 16.
- PRRT payable decreased 20.6% from $1,867.1 million last year to $1,483.3 million this year, largely due to decreased production and lower oil prices.
Interpreting the results
Many large corporate groups consist of smaller entities whose aggregated total income meets the transparency population income thresholds. If these entities are not consolidated for tax purposes, some or all of the entities may not individually meet the income thresholds for inclusion in the report.
The complexity and diversity of large corporate groups mean that the corporation's income may be distributed and returned by multiple entities within an economic group. This can change the nil tax paid percentages when the entire group is taken into consideration. For a detailed explanation, see Net losses and nil tax payable.
It is important to note that the total figures in this report does not reflect the:
- complexity of the tax system
- relationships between entities
- calculations behind the numbers
- extent and nature of any ATO activity.
Corporate tax transparency reports are our analysis of the aggregate annual tax return data published in the annual Report of entity tax informationExternal Link. Some names listed in the Report of entity tax information may be recognisable to the public and connections to high-profile individuals may be the subject of public knowledge. Due to secrecy provisions in the tax law we are only able to publish certain data in respect of each eligible entity. For example, secrecy provisions prevent us from disclosing any additional information about specific entities beyond the 3 data points provided for in the legislation.
Tax information is also protected by privacy legislation, limiting what we can cover in this report. The report doesn't include operating profits, tax losses or tax offsets. These could help to provide a more complete understanding of a corporate's tax position.
The data doesn't reflect any audit or compliance work. The report is based on information contained in an entity's tax return at a point in time. The tax return may later be amended, and the amount published in this report may no longer reflect the amount of tax actually paid. However, when we lock in outcomes as part of settlements these will be reflected in the future tax returns lodged and the outcomes will be reflected in future reports.
Figures in this report have generally been rounded, which may result in differences between totals and sums of components used in the charts and text.