My guess is that they tried to claim the "value-add" was all in this other jurisdiction (e.g. the DB or the "secret sauce" algorithm, or something as boring as applying their "valuable" trademark after paying a license fee).

Canadian mining companies do this with "hedging" contracts with their Swiss subsidiary that is basically a desk with 3 directors. Wait until you've hit a low in the market, then sign away the future growth to the subsidiary for "price-stability".

On the WAN side, I deliberately choose foreign AWS locations just to avoid the sales tax from domestic AWS sites...