The reason Pfizer legally have no profits is because they've structured the transactions between their subsidiaries so that all the profits are in a subsidiary

The reason Pfizer legally have no profits is because they've structured the transactions between their subsidiaries so that all the profits are in a subsidiary in a low-tax country. Their particular method of achieving this is apparently buying their active ingredients from an Irish subsidiary of themselves that is so expensive that the main company actually loses money on them: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-pfizer-tax-insight-idUSKCN0T51ZS20151116 http://www.reuters.com/article/us-pfizer-tax-insight-idUSKCN... (Except of course they're not actually losing money except for tax purposes, because it all goes to a wholly-owned subsidiary they control.)