Gilead Sciences executives were acutely aware in 2013 that their plan to charge an exorbitantly high price for a powerful new hepatitis C drug would spark public outrage, but they pursued the profit-driven strategy anyway, according to a Senate Finance Committee investigation report released Tuesday. (courtesy of Gilead Sciences, Inc.) 
 
 Over the last few years, Gilead Sciences has grown into one of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies, fueled by the sales of expensive specialty treatments for hepatitis C. The company’s revenue has tripled since 2012, to $32.6 billion last year. A representative for Apple declined to comment. Gilead gained federal approval for its drug Sovaldi in late 2013 and ultimately settled on the price of $84,000 for a 12-week course of treatment. That drug was followed by another treatment, Harvoni, which carried a list price of $94,500. In 2013, Gilead’s chief financial officer said the company’s tax rate would “decline over time” because its intellectual property for Sovaldi had been transferred to a subsidiary in Ireland, which has a lower corporate tax rate, 12.5 percent, than the United States. Instead, because treating more advanced patients would be more cost effective, the state implemented a plan to treat at the rate of 500 patients a year for the first six years. Tax Policy 
 
 Under current law, U.S. companies owe the full 35 percent corporate tax rate -- the highest of any industrialized nation - - on income they earn around the world. The company would have to pay about $9.7 billion in taxes if it brought those profits back to the United States, according to the report.
– A pharmaceutical company that has in recent years made billions of dollars on hepatitis C treatments—the three the FDA has approved range from $75,000 to $94,500—has been named a "price gouger" and "tax dodger" in a new report. Gilead Sciences, the sixth richest drugmaker in the world, "is making a fortune selling essential drugs to the very government and taxpayers that helped pay to develop them, and then dodging taxes on the resulting profits," says Frank Clemente, executive director of Americans for Tax Fairness, which issued the report this month. Gilead has avoided some $10 billion in taxes by moving assets to Ireland, where there is a lower tax rate, and then not bringing some $28.5 billion in profits back into the US. Per the Washington Post, the California-based company's revenues in 2015 hit $32.6 billion, up three times from 2012. As for the accusation of gouging: Last year, a Senate investigation found that the company "pursued [a] profit-driven strategy" with its hepatitis drugs, rather than making the drugs more accessible at a lower price (it had considered $50,000). As the Post notes, Gilead, which declined to comment on the report, isn't alone in looking overseas for tax relief. Plenty of other pharmaceutical and technology companies do it. Apple, for instance, has squirreled away nearly $200 billion abroad, Bloomberg reported last year. According to Citizens for Tax Justice, that's enabled the company to avoid paying $59.2 billion in US taxes. Pfizer has some $193 billion abroad, per the Post. The new report singling out Gilead, the Post points out, highlights the "simmering battle" between President Obama and big business over the practice of sending assets to foreign countries.