The Afterhours: Birkenstock struggles to find its footing; IRS says Microsoft owes $29 billion
Published: 18:49 11 Oct 2023 EDT
Birkenstock finished its first trading day on the New York Stock Exchange Wednesday 12.6% lower.
Shares of the German sandal maker closed at about US$40 after opening at about US$41, below its initial public offering (IPO) pricing of US$46 per share.
Meanwhile, Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) said it received Notices of Proposed Adjustment from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) for an additional tax payment of $28.9 billion, according to an 8-K form filed Wednesday.
The company said the issue stems from its allocated profits between differing countries and jurisdictions from 2004 to 2013. Microsoft added that up to $10 billion in taxes the company claims it already paid are not reflected in the proposed adjustments made by the IRS.
As such, Microsoft intends to contest the notices through the IRS’ administrative appeal process, the company said.
Elsewhere, DeepMind, the AI lab owned by Google-parent Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG), cut its employee costs by nearly 40% last year, according to a recent filing with a UK government agency.
In the company’s 2022 fiscal year, staff costs and related expenses were roughly $731 million, compared to nearly $1.2 billion in 2021, according to the filing. DeepMind’s profit in 2022 was about $74.9 million, similarly down nearly 40% from roughly $126 million a year earlier.
On the heels of those cuts, DeepMind announced in January that it would close its first-ever artificial intelligence (AI) research office in Edmonton, Alberta.
