Apple boosted its profits through "a sweetheart deal with the Irish government", Senator Carl Levin, chairman of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, said today, following the publication of the European Commission's assessment on Apple's tax arrangements in Ireland.

In a statement Mr Levin, who, along with his brother Sandy, has a track record of bashing corporate tax dodgers, said that the EU’s investigation has confirmed what his Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations showed: that there is such a deal.

“The facts are abundantly clear: Apple developed its crown jewels -- lucrative intellectual property -- in the United States, used a tax loophole to shift the profits generated by that valuable property offshore to avoid paying US taxes, then boosted its profits through a sweetheart deal with the Irish government,” he said.

Adding that Apple’s Irish tax rate has “no rational basis”, Mr Levin said that it was determined by “what Apple was ‘prepared to accept’ - with the threat that it would cut jobs in Ireland if it didn’t get its way”.

“That low tax rate came on top of Apple’s ploy of saying its three main Irish subsidiaries are not tax resident anywhere. Hopefully this finding will help persuade Congress that we should close the loopholes in our tax code that allow Apple-type gimmicks whose sole purpose is to avoid paying US taxes.”