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German publisher Bertelsmann is to acquire Random House from New York publishing house Advance Publications, for an undisclosed sum believed to be around $2 billion.

Carnival Corporation of Miami, together with a group of Norwegian investors led by Christiania Markets, is to buy the Cunard cruise ship line from the Norwegian Kvaerner Group for $500 million. The Cunard line operates five cruise ships. Carnival has also reached an agreement with Kvaerner-Masa Yards to develop and design a new class of ships for Cunard.

Approximately one year ago, the German government announced ambitious plans to broaden the tax base and cut tax rates to achieve net annual tax reductions exceeding Dm30 billion ($16.6 billion). This "great tax reform" has so far been caught up in political deadlock. Nevertheless, some significant legislation has emerged.

Argentina's Executive has announced a comprehensive package of fiscal measures, which has been submitted to Congress for approval.

In the first of three articles on investment in Indochina, John Fisher and Tim Watson of Coopers & Lybrand, Melbourne and Ho Chi Minh City analyse Cambodia’s attractions, which include flexibility and some unique tax incentives and guarantees

Hong Kong’s 1998/1999 budget presented the Special Administrative Region with a challenge – to ballast the economy against instability, but at the same time attract investment. Sunny Choong of Price Waterhouse, Hong Kong examines the results

In the second part of International Tax Review’s survey of oil and gas taxation, Peter Poulos of KPMG, Melbourne examines how Australia’s tax regime applies in the context of the energy industry, and highlights international considerations

Tax authorities in several countries have recently indicated that they will not allow deductions for expenditure on adapting computer systems for the year 2000. There is widespread concern that computer systems will not be able to cope when the two figure year changes from 99 to 00. Revenue authorities in Australia, Canada, Germany, Switzerland, the UK and the US have all suggested that the cost of solving this problem will be given no special treatment.

Deloitte & Touche in the US has acquired the assets of Real Estate Tax Services Inc. When the acquisition is complete, Real Estate Tax Services will operate in 25 US offices of Deloitte & Touche, as Deloitte & Touche Property Tax Services.

The Japanese prime minister Ryutaro Hashimoto has announced a three-year plan to reduce corporation taxes. The aim is to bring taxes down to the same rate as in other industrialized nations. Recent reductions have cut the effective rate to 46.36%. However, there is uncertainty over the strength of the goverment's commitment to low taxes. Jonathan Stuart-Smith, senior manager at Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu in Tokyo notes that: ?Some of the tax cuts announced so far are only temporary but the government is coming under increased pressure to make them permanent.? There are fears that the government may be tempted to increase taxes again once the economy shows signs of recovery. Japan has a high level of public debt and the government is committed to halving its budget deficit to within 3% of GDP. Last year's fiscal austerity law has been delayed to accommodate the reductions, but the government may not allow further delays in future years.