Top football agent loses £1.2m tax avoidance case

Agent to nine of Arsenal's '89 league winners

Tom Ellis
clock • 1 min read

Former football agent Jerome Anderson has lost a £1.2m tax avoidance battle with HM Revenue & Customers (HMRC).

Anderson and eight others failed in their attempt to avoid large amounts of tax in a case heard at the Upper Tribunal, HMRC said. The taxman said the scheme involved investments in the recruitment and training of young footballers at the Bafana Soccer Academy in South Africa. HMRC said Anderson attempted to use the investment to claim £3m artificial trading loss to reduce his tax bill by "huge amounts of money". The tribunal found Anderson's activities were more like those of an investor and this did not show he was trading, and so could not claim a trading loss and consequently du...

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