Internationalization and tax avoidance practices of publicly listed firms within the European Union:The influence of board independence

Abstract: The main aim of this research is to investigate if large multinational firms publicly listed in the European Union avoid more taxation than less international firms. Furthermore, the composition of the board of directors in terms of independence is considered as a potential moderating influence. I perform Pooled OLS regressions on a 2008-2016 sample of 5,118 firm-year observations, incorporating 669 firms from 21 countries. The results show a negative influence of the level of internationalization on tax avoidance, and this relation is found to be weakened by board independence.