The Maryland Court of Special Appeals affirmed the tax court’s decision that a Macy’s captive insurance company is exempt from Maryland corporate income taxes on interest payments received from a Macy’s affiliate. Maryland imposes a premium receipts tax on unauthorized insurance companies, which includes the taxpayer captive insurer in this case. The taxpayer captive insurer paid no premium receipts tax to Maryland for the years at issue. However, the Maryland law says: “the premium receipts tax under this section is instead of all other State taxes.” The Court of Specials Appeals found this language to be unambiguous—a company subject to the premium receipts tax is exempt from all other taxes, without other conditions. The court noted that while exempting taxpayers who do not pay any premium receipts tax from other taxes may not have been the legislative intent, the court said it was bound by the plain language of the statute.
