Apple is using legal accounting tricks to avoid tax on foreign earnings. According to the US tech giant’s financial documents it has only paid $713 mn in tax on foreign earnings of $36.8 bn in the fiscal year ended Sept. 29.

According to reports, Apple’s overseas tax rate of 1.9pc is well below below the corporate tax rate of 35pc in the US and 24pc in Britain.

The documents reveal that its foreign earnings grew 53 per cent from fiscal 2011, when Apple earned $24 billion outside the US and paid income tax of 2.5 per cent on it, according to Sunday Times.

Like any other company Apple is using legal tricks to avoid tax. For example it may pay some income taxes on its profit to the country in which it sells its products, but it minimizes them by using various accounting moves to shift profits to countries with low tax rates.

According to Sunday Times, Apple is resorting to  tax minimizing tricks, channelling much of its business in Britain and Europe through a subsidiary on an industrial estate in County Cork, the Sunday Times reports.