International Trade committee  If we're talking strictly about tax information exchange agreements, the answer is no. Panama has only negotiated international double taxation agreements that include standards on information exchange. According to what we have been told, Panama is interested in concluding more comprehensive agreements rather than agreements that are limited to information exchange.

International Trade committee  A double taxation agreement contains provisions under which the country of residence must eliminate double taxation when the same income is being taxed by two countries. Usually, these kinds of agreements reduce withholding tax rates. Our withholding tax rate on dividends, interest and royalties, as set out in the Income Tax Act, is 25%.

International Trade committee  The answer is twofold. I think that the actual list from 2002 is frozen in time and will not change. More recently, in 2009, a black/grey list was created. The black list consists of completely uncooperative countries. At this time, Panama finds itself on the so-called grey list.

International Trade committee  No.

International Trade committee  Are you talking about Panama and the United States?

International Trade committee  No.

International Trade committee  That's a good question. Generally speaking, the purpose of a double taxation agreement is to reduce the tax barriers our companies face when they invest in other countries. The idea is to eliminate double taxation and to reduce the rates of withholding tax, which is payable on dividends, interest, and so on.

International Trade committee  Yes.

International Trade committee  First of all, we had informal contact for over a year, and the minister wrote at the end of July.

International Trade committee  There was an official approach by the Government of Canada and there was no response. So we're still waiting for a response on this. Panama even said at a recent meeting at a global forum where peer review takes place that they have never refused to enter into a tax information exchange agreement.

International Trade committee  No. They were approached at the official level before that. Panama kept telling us it preferred to negotiate a double taxation agreement. And we said we preferred a tax information exchange agreement. Panama had written the minister in November 2009, and then the minister decided to write in July to record that we preferred to negotiate a tax information exchange agreement.

International Trade committee  Your question is a good one, but I don't think I can answer it.

International Trade committee  The minister did write to his Panamanian counterpart. We have still not received a response. We are not in disagreement over concluding an information exchange agreement, but over what mechanism we should use. We would prefer to have an information exchange agreement similar to those negotiated with a number of other countries over the last year and a half.

International Trade committee  Good afternoon. To make it short, Panama was singled out as a tax haven by the OECD in 2001. In 2002 it made a commitment to the OECD that it would put in place an arrangement to exchange tax information with anyone who wants to get an agreement. In the last two years, Panama has been very active negotiating comprehensive double taxation agreements that include the OECD standard for the exchange of information.

Finance committee  No.