On the Corriere della Sera the journalist Aldo Cazzullo has returned to criticize the choice of the Italian tennis player Jannik Sinner to have residence in the principality of Monaco, the independent city-state where there is a tax regime that is enormously more convenient than in Italy (often also called Monte Carlo, from the name of the most central area of the principality ). The question of Sinner’s residency has become topical again after his historic victory at the Australian Open, one of the four most important and prestigious tournaments, and it was also discussed in Sinner’s press conference on Wednesday. But the debate over this specific aspect of Sinner’s life, indicated as a single false note in the otherwise perfect account of the character and his recent triumph, fails to contextualize several things about the lives of professional tennis players.
As it has explained well Giorgio Di Maio on the sports site The Last Man, a large number of top-level tennis players live in the principality of Monaco not only for economic but also sporting reasons. And furthermore, the most advantageous taxation only concerns advertising and commercial revenues, not those deriving from victories in tournaments.
Jannik Sinner has interrupted a fast in the men’s Slam since Panatta’s victory in Paris in 1976. However, the moment of national jubilation in these hours has also brought with it the inevitable controversy: it is the law of social media.
We had already started talking about taxes and Jannik Sinner when the tennis player withdrew from being called up for the Davis Cup groups. On that occasion Aldo Cazzullo intervened to invite Sinner to remove his tax residence in Monte Carlo, then returning to the topic in these hours in which the topic is trending. Same thing done by the former mayor of Rome Gianni Alemanno.
It is not the first time that sport and taxation have been discussed. An example is the Valentino Rossi-Italian State issue. Rossi was accused by the Pesaro court of having evaded 43.7 million euros in the period 2001-2004. According to the Pesaro court, Rossi, who was resident in the United Kingdom at the time, had not declared compensation for a total of 59 million euros and then settled with the Court between 2008 and 2009.
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