i think this is basically what apple does, licensing their IP to themselves, but still, that's not illegal.
Discussion
Companies have much more leeway than individuals with these practices. They can set up subsidiaries, fund R&D, yada, yada...
It's pretty much the same, but not quite.
Once the money is syphoned put of the company, as suit bonuses and so on, the individuals need to pay taxes on their residence country. If the company was to be found instead to be hiring shell companies on tax heavens, owned by the same suits, that would also be illegal afaik.
depends, if there is no income tax in your country of residence, you are exempt. take digital nomads as an example, they invoice their off shore company and since they are not staying longer than 183 days in a country, they are basically pay 0% tax. thats all 100% legally fine.
Yes, but digital nomads are non-residents and pay no income tax on their residence country (because they don't have one) - that is, if you aren't a citizen of one of the few countries that has global income tax.
That's not what we are talking about, nor what the Panama papers were about. They were about people that had a network of shell companies and foundations to divest funds off-shore, which is illegal pretty much everywhere, because is tax evassion, and potentially money laundry.