Toronto Maple Leaf’s Capitan John Tavares has filed an appeal against the Canadian Revenue Agency over an 8 million dollar discrepancy in his income tax. This came in a tax review from 2018 where the CRA discovered Tavares’s income was $17.8 million higher than reported. So the $8 million is broken up into $6.8 million in taxes and then $1.2 million in interest from 2018.
2018 was the year Tavares made a major career change in signing a large 7 year $77 million dollar deal with the Leaf’s after spending the first 8 years of his career in New York with the Islanders. The tricky part about the deal is a majority of Tavares’s earnings was converted into a signing bonus. When he signed the deal with the Leaf’s he was still a resident of New York so the bonus was taxed at 13%.
Tom Mcinerney, an investment expert, who is watching this case closely said, “He will likely win and he will not be owing the taxes because it was part of his contract the way it was structed.”
Tavares as of now has filed the appeal and there has yet to be a response from the CRA. The Court proceedings could take many months to possibly years.
Tom also added that if Tavares is successful, other athletes would not have to worry about the CRA coming after them. He said, ” The CRA is just trying to see how strong these contracts are in court.”
Tom also said that this will not affect athletes signing Canadians in the future, especially if Tavares is successful in the court proceedings.
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