Starbucks won its fight on Tuesday against an EU demand to pay up to €30 million ($33 million) in back taxes to the Netherlands.
The case was part of European Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager's crackdown on unlawful tax breaks offered by EU countries to multinationals, which has also extended to Apple's Irish deal and Amazon's Luxembourg deal, among others.
In Starbucks' case, the EU competition enforcer failed to show that the US coffee chain benefited unfairly from the Dutch tax deal, the court said.
"The Commission was unable to demonstrate the existence of an advantage in favour of Starbucks," judges said.
The Dutch finance ministry said the judgment showed that the multinational was treated the same as other companies.
Starbucks also welcomed the ruling, saying it had not received any special tax treatment from the Netherlands and that it "pays all of its taxes wherever they are due".
News by Reuters, edited by ESM. Click subscribe to sign up to ESM: European Supermarket Magazine.
