Cross‐border cooperation and tax avoidance of U.S. cross‐listed firms

Abstract We investigate how cross‐border cooperation formed by the Multilateral Memorandum of Understanding (MMoU) affects tax avoidance of foreign firms cross‐listed in the U.S. Prior studies show that the MMoU enhances U.S. SEC's regulatory oversight of foreign firms and increases such firms' corporate governance. We utilize data from 27 jurisdictions from 2000 to 2009 and find that U.S. cross‐listed firms mitigate tax avoidance more than do their home‐listed peers after their home jurisdictions become signatories of the MMoU. Our further analyses reveal that improved information environment and enhanced foreign institutional investor monitoring are two possible underlying mechanisms, consistent with the complementarity theory of tax avoidance that self‐serving managers can employ tax avoidance to divert assets when corporate governance is ineffective. We also show that the effect of the MMoU increases with U.S. IRS monitoring and the strength of institutional regimes in foreign firms' home jurisdictions. Collectively, our findings elucidate unintended consequences of the MMoU and provide implications for practitioners and regulators.