Adani avoids corporate tax on $1 billion revenue from Carmichael coal mine

According to financial accounts analyzed by The Guardian, Adani's Carmichael thermal coal operations in Queensland pulled $963.5 million from the Galilee Basin over the twelve months to 31 March — then booked a $340.6 million loss and walked away with a zero-dollar company tax bill. The mine has never paid corporate tax since opening in 2021. That is not a glitch. It is the architecture.

Following the Money

The trick is mundane and devastating in equal measure. Production costs and "related party logistics expenses" — fees routed to other Adani-controlled entities — consumed the revenue line until the books showed red. Adani Mining also paid $58 million in state royalties over the period, plus a further $33.1 million to a related party. The state records a royalty receipt; the corporate ledger records a cost. Same money, two different stories.

Industry groups backing the project had promised that Carmichael's taxes and royalties would fund Queensland schools, hospitals, and infrastructure "for almost a century." A spokesperson for Adani Mining insists the company "complies fully" with state and commonwealth taxation obligations and points to 1,400 direct jobs for Queenslanders. Compliance, in this context, means structuring the books so the obligation rounds to zero.

The Capital Structure Is the Crime

Tim Buckley, director of Climate Energy Finance and a former investment banker, told The Guardian plainly: the operation was structured so that it wouldn't pay corporate tax in Australia. That should end the debate. This is not a company caught in hard times. This is a company that designed its capital structure to ensure profits disappear into intra-group deductions while the public absorbs the climate damage and the infrastructure load.

The pattern repeats at the port. Adani-controlled Abbot Point — operating as North Queensland Export Terminal — earned $356.6 million and likewise paid no tax, recording a $6.8 million loss after operating expenses. Terminal CEO Mark Smith described this as a reflection of the "capital-intensive nature" of owning major export infrastructure. A controlled burn dressed up as an accounting reality.

What Changes This

Buckley's prescription is correct: Australia needs new rules limiting the deductions foreign entities can claim against Australian earnings, and we need them now. But we should be clear-eyed about what we are actually confronting. Carmichael only exists because successive governments approved a new thermal coal jurisdiction the planet cannot afford. The zero-tax outcome exists because related-party deductions are still legal. The political cover exists because 1,400 jobs and vague "almost a century" promises were enough to neutralize opposition.

If we want different outcomes, we legislate: thin-capitalization rules, limits on intra-group financing, and mandatory public country-by-country reporting so the public can see where revenue actually settles. Until then, Adani's tax-free billion is not a scandal. It is the system doing precisely what it was designed to do.