Law serves to create order in an otherwise chaotic world. In this article, the authors navigate the complex world of intellectual property (IP) and intangibles in multinational enterprises (MNEs). Legal and transfer pricing (TP) professionals operate based on their own defined frameworks, some of which collide in practice. Economic ownership seems to be tacitly included in the OECD Transfer Pricing Guidelines, which frequently results in mismatches originating from the varying concepts of ownership in the legal and TP landscape. The authors explore how IP structures must balance commercial, legal and fiscal interests and attempt to bridge the gap between legal frameworks and economic substance.