When Botox met Viagra

Last week’s $160 billion megamerger between US pharma giant Pfizer (NYSE: PFE) and Irish-based Allergan (NYSE: AGN) did more than just create a world’s largest drug company. The Pharma Letter's Katie Osborne reports.

The controversial deal, confirmed last Monday after months of speculation, will also go down in history as the largest tax inversion arrangement to date and will enable Pfizer to avoid paying an estimated $20 billion in US corporation tax.

It is this that has prompted widespread criticism, indeed fury, amongst policymakers in the USA and in Europe, who have been working hard to try to stop the practice, which they say deprives the USA of billions of dollars in tax.