A debt deduction is not disallowed under the thin capitalisation rules where, throughout an income year, either of the following apply. The head company is:
- both a foreign controlled Australian company and an ADI (ignoring the application of the consolidation rules; that is, classify the ADI as if it were a separate entity) and has not made a choice to treat an Australian branch as part of itself for thin capitalisation purposes
- the head company is a foreign controlled Australian company that
- beneficially owns all the membership interest in a member of the group that is both a foreign controlled Australian entity and an ADI throughout that period
- would (ignoring the application of the consolidation rules) have no other assets and no debt capital.
If at least one other member of the group is an outward investing financial entity (non-ADI) or outward investing entity (ADI) for a period, the exemption does not apply.
A debt deduction is further not disallowed if the above conditions are satisfied for part of an income year only and the debt deduction is incurred by the head company during that period.
Specialist credit card institutions
This exemption does not apply where all the ADIs that are members of the group are specialist credit card institutions. See Choice to treat specialist credit card institutions as financial entities and not ADIs.
For more information, see sections: