Anson V. HMRC: Another Approach To LLCs

On July 1^st, 2015 the UK Supreme Court released its judgment in the case of Anson v. Commissioners for Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs (Anson),¹ in which the issue was how a taxpayer's interest in a Delaware limited liability company (LLC) should be treated under UK tax law. The Court's decision has received a great deal of attention in the UK, as it contradicts, to a certain extent, Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs (HMRC)'s historic position that an LLC should be treated as "opaque" for UK tax purposes.

The facts in the case may be summarised as follows. The taxpayer in the case (Anson) was a non-domiciled UK resident and member of an LLC which carried on the business of managing venture capital funds in the US. The LLC was treated as a partnership for US tax purposes and thus, a transparent entity for US tax purposes, meaning that the partners were liable to tax on its income, rather than the LLC itself. Anson received distributions from the LLC (net of