Beyond the Tax Rulings: Apple 2.0 – Capital Allowances, Equal Treatment and the Limits of Member State Fiscal Autonomy under Article 107(1) of the TFEU

The Court of Justice of the European Union’s 10 September 2024 decision in Commission v. Ireland and Others (C-465/20 P) closed one chapter of the Apple controversy and opened another. The Grand Chamber’s finding that the pre-2015 IP-related profits were attributable, for Irish tax purposes, to the Irish branches of ASI and AOE weakens the factual premise of the post-2015 structure. Apple 2.0 — the operation of section 291A of the Taxes Consolidation Act 1997 between 2015 and 2017 — raises State aid questions distinct from the closed dispute that bring into operation the equal treatment rationale of article 107(1) of the TFEU.