1,149 large companies paid no income tax: what the ATO data actually shows

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Business | 3 October 2026

Almost three in ten large companies covered by Australia’s latest corporate tax transparency data reported no income tax payable for the 2024–25 financial year. That headline is eye-catching, but it does not mean 1,149 companies were automatically avoiding tax.

Data reported by the Australian Taxation Office and summarised by ABC News covers 4,299 large corporate entities. Of those, 3,150 entities — 73 per cent — reported tax payable, while 1,149 — 27 per cent — reported no tax payable. Total corporate income tax payable across the population was $87.5 billion, down $8.2 billion, or 8.6 per cent, from the previous year.

Why can a large company legitimately report no tax?

The ATO’s own guidance warns against treating a nil-tax figure as proof of wrongdoing. Corporate income tax is based on taxable profit rather than gross revenue, and a company may have no tax payable because it made an operating loss, used carried-forward tax losses, claimed lawful offsets or credits, or was in a project or investment phase where deductible expenditure reduced taxable income.

The ATO also points out that a single company may sit inside a larger economic group. One entity in a group can report no tax while another entity in the same group pays tax. That makes simple company-by-company comparisons potentially misleading.

What the transparency report actually publishes

Australia’s corporate tax transparency regime publishes a limited set of information from eligible tax returns. For income years from 2022–23 onwards, the population includes corporate tax entities with total income of at least $100 million, as well as entities with petroleum resource rent tax payable.

The ATO says the public report is based on information in tax returns and does not include the full financial context needed to calculate an effective tax rate. It does not publish operating profit, tax losses, all tax offsets or every relationship between entities. Returns can also later be amended.

That distinction matters. A company with substantial total income can still have low or nil taxable income after deductions and losses, while another business with similar revenue can have a very different tax outcome.

The ATO is still scrutinising profit shifting

Nil tax does not automatically mean avoidance, but the ATO continues to focus heavily on arrangements that can shift profits or deductions across borders.

In its latest public and multinational business reporting, the ATO says global profit shifting remains a major focus in disputes. For 2024–25, its compliance work with public and multinational businesses raised $4.11 billion in total liabilities, including tax, interest and penalties, and it says a further $2.2 billion was paid voluntarily following preventive compliance interventions.

ABC News also reported that the ATO is paying attention to offshore financing and marketing arrangements and is increasing scrutiny of newer AI businesses as their Australian operations grow.

Why the $87.5 billion total fell

The latest total tax payable was lower than the previous year. According to the ATO figures reported by ABC, weaker commodity prices, slow economic growth and high interest rates were among the broader conditions affecting company results.

That means movements in corporate tax receipts can reflect the economic cycle as well as compliance activity. Resource companies, banks, retailers and technology businesses do not move in lockstep, and changes in profitability can have a large effect on the total tax collected from year to year.

What readers should take from the numbers

The strongest conclusion from the transparency data is not that every company with no tax payable has done something wrong. It is that Australia now publishes enough information to identify broad patterns, while the ATO uses much more detailed private information for audits and assurance work.

For readers comparing companies, three questions are more useful than simply asking whether tax payable was zero:

• Was the company profitable for tax purposes in that year?
• Were tax losses, offsets or credits available?
• Is the entity being viewed on its own or as part of a wider corporate group?

Those questions do not answer whether an individual company paid the “right” amount of tax, but they help avoid turning a transparency figure into a conclusion the published data cannot support.

Sources

• ABC News — ATO says 1,149 large companies paid no tax
• Australian Taxation Office — Report of entity tax information
• Australian Taxation Office — Tax Avoidance Taskforce

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