content: Most American companies base their euro operations in Ireland, Switzerland or Luxembourg, still part of the EU, as a separate entity. This gives the competition watchdog for the EU the right to investigate them and impose sanctions or fines in Europe if they break rules. Apple, Microsoft etc only pay between 2%-14% corporation tax in these countries so they allow the EU to rubber stamp these deals every few years for show. TLDR: they can't route profits through a law tax zone if the EU don't allow it.