Ufotable Under Investigation For Tax Evasion

[Guardian Enzo]

http://www.otakuusamagazine.com/fate...d-tax-evasion/

This is a major, major story with potentially big implications in anime. Don't sleep on this one.

[GreyZone]

This better not cause issues for F/SN:HF movie 3!

[Guardian Enzo]

If they're found guilty it's going to cause issues with everything, since they're likely to be shut down.

[serenade_beta]

I don't really think the implications to anime in general will be that big. I frankly don't remember the last TV anime they made, if any, outside of Fate, so if only Fate disappears... *shrug*
It's great they make pretty anime, but if they can't or won't make TV anime series, they aren't much of a loss, unfortunately.

[Cosmic Eagle]

Originally Posted by Guardian Enzo

If they're found guilty it's going to cause issues with everything, since they're likely to be shut down.

What's to prevent the animation staff who do the actual legwork from reforming elsewhere though? Technicians usually are not the ones behind such cases

[Guardian Enzo]

Originally Posted by Cosmic Eagle

What's to prevent the animation staff who do the actual legwork from reforming elsewhere though? Technicians usually are not the ones behind such cases

Of course they can do that, but who's going to bankroll it? Anime studios are chronically underfunded with younger staff working as virtual slaves as is. At the very least it would take a considerable amount of time to put together backers and do the endless legwork. In the meantime the animators - who need to eat and most of whom are contractors anyway - will latch on elsewhere and take whatever paying gigs they can find. You'd never put Humpty-Dumpty back together again looking like he did before the fall.

[Guardian Enzo]

Originally Posted by serenade_beta

I don't really think the implications to anime in general will be that big. I frankly don't remember the last TV anime they made, if any, outside of Fate, so if only Fate disappears... *shrug*
It's great they make pretty anime, but if they can't or won't make TV anime series, they aren't much of a loss, unfortunately.

Well, just this season they're doing Kimitsu no Yaiba, which is a fairly important project. And the Fate franchise is one of the most lucrative in all of Japanese media.

There are other factors here too that potentially impact the entire industry, not least of which this will cause every studio to come under much closer scrutiny. There's also the fact that Ufotable occupies quite an unusual niche in the industry and their failure would have consequences that are impossible to fully gauge before the fact.

[Cosmic Eagle]

Originally Posted by Guardian Enzo

Of course they can do that, but who's going to bankroll it? Anime studios are chronically underfunded with younger staff working as virtual slaves as is. At the very least it would take a considerable amount of time to put together backers and do the endless legwork. In the meantime the animators - who need to eat and most of whom are contractors anyway - will latch on elsewhere and take whatever paying gigs they can find. You'd never put Humpty-Dumpty back together again looking like he did before the fall.

Of course not, but UFOtable pedigree is still bound to have more investors than random anime startup #xxxx. The animators of course will go where they have to but the skills from UFOtable shouldn't be lost just like that (at least I think UFOtable uses a somewhat different animation style from its peers. Could be wrong though)

[Nachtwandler]

People, you should stop exagerrating things.

1. This is only an alleged charge, not the real one.
2. Only the studio president is under the ivestigation, not the studio itself. In the worst case he can take the blame and resign. It will be bad but will not result in studio shut down.
3. Investigation will take a year minimum.

[SeijiSensei]

Sounds like a rather unique case rather than an indication of widespread corruption throughout the industry. (I'm not denying that there may be corruption elsewhere, but this case against Ufotable doesn't seem to have industry-wide implications.)

[Kanon]

Originally Posted by GreyZone

This better not cause issues for F/SN:HF movie 3!

We waited all these years for HF, if it ended up never being finished it would devastating.

Nachtwandler's post is reassuring.

[serenade_beta]

Originally Posted by Guardian Enzo

Well, just this season they're doing Kimitsu no Yaiba, which is a fairly important project. And the Fate franchise is one of the most lucrative in all of Japanese media.

Well, ufotable doesn't own the Fate franchise. If their plans to do whatever are gone, whoever owns that IP can just go somewhere else.
Yes, perhaps their Infinite Budget Works allows them to make prettier animation than others, I hardly doubt the Fate franchise can't survive without them.

[Cosmic Eagle]

Originally Posted by serenade_beta

Well, ufotable doesn't own the Fate franchise. If their plans to do whatever are gone, whoever owns that IP can just go somewhere else.
Yes, perhaps their Infinite Budget Works allows them to make prettier animation than others, I hardly doubt the Fate franchise can't survive without them.

FGO alone has raked in more than UFO ever will I think......6 billion dollars so far. Certain national defence budgets are lower than that

[serenade_beta]

Originally Posted by Cosmic Eagle

FGO alone has raked in more than UFO ever will I think......6 billion dollars so far. Certain national defence budgets are lower than that

Putting aside FGO (since I don't care much about it outside the fact BiliBili gets a portion of the money which they can use to support other stuff), the "UFO" thing was really funny, because in the trends at one point, there was "UFO Tax Evasion (translated)", which made it look like an UFO (unidentified flying object) evaded taxes.

[Calca]

No wonder their animation budget is so big.

[dragon1412]

There is also the options of paying it back if he got charged though, if i remember correctly, you could get out simply paying the tax and a penalty payments. So yeah, not as serious as it sound,. He will get some issues, but i sincerely thought it won't lead to resignation. And at this point though, he is only under suspicion, not a real charge yet

[serenade_beta]

I think this is an update on the situation?
http://news.livedoor.com/article/detail/16305010/