Amazon's Luxembourg Taxes Under Scrutiny From European Regulators

European officials have asked Luxembourg to hand over documents relating to U.S. online retailer Amazon's tax affairs in the country, the Financial Times reported on Thursday, citing official sources.

The EU's competition commission has requested information from the Grand Duchy, where the online retailer's main European operating company is based, to check whether its decisions on corporate tax complied with state aid rules, the FT said, citing two people familiar with the matter.

(Also see: France Passes 'Anti-Amazon' Bill That Bans Free Delivery of Discounted Books)

"We are looking into what kind of arrangement Luxembourg has with Amazon," the British newspaper quoted an EU official as saying.

The FT, citing another EU official, said that Brussels was carrying out fact-finding missions in a number of EU countries to crack down on "sweetheart" tax deal with large companies.

A spokesman for the European Commission declined to comment on the report, while Amazon could not immediately be reached for comment.

Britain, France and Germany have called for stricter rules to stop companies such as Google, Apple and Amazon aggressively avoiding taxes in austerity-bitten Europe.

(Also see: EU Probing Apple Tax Rulings in Ireland, Luxembourg and the Netherlands)

© Thomson Reuters 2014