The Australian Taxation Office’s annual corporate tax transparency report on large corporate taxpayers shows that the nation’s mining industry continues as the largest contributor to tax payable of any industry, with $24.6 billion paid in company tax for 2024-25.
Despite weaker global commodity prices which reduced profitability and tax contributions, Australia’s minerals industry paid the largest amount of any sector in company tax – funding vital services and infrastructure for all Australians.
The ATO is required by law to publish tax information reported by certain large corporates each year, with its 2024-25 corporate tax transparency covering 4,299 corporate entities, of which 1,824 are foreign-owned companies with an income of $100 million or more, 593 are Australian public entities with an income of $100 million or more and 1,882 are Australian-owned resident private companies with an income of $100 million or more.
The ATO also commented that Australia is a world leader in business tax compliance and transparency.
The ATO’s tax gap analysis – the difference between the estimated amount of tax the ATO expects to collect and the estimate of the amount of tax they theoretically would collect – shows for the most recent assessment year of 2022-23 that the net tax gap for Large Corporate Groups, including many MCA member companies, was only 3.7%, less than all other business income tax segments with Medium Business coming in second at 8.4%. The tax gap for Large Corporate Groups in 2021-22 was 4.0%.
The ATO also observed that for the mining industry there is a strong relationship between profitability and tax payable in all years, despite changes in commodity prices, reinforcing the high standard of tax compliance practices within the industry.
