Directive 2018/822 - Amendment of Directive 2011/16/EU as regards mandatory automatic exchange of information in the field of taxation in relation to reportable cross-border arrangements - Main contents

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

L 139/1

In order to accommodate new initiatives in the field of tax transparency at the level of the Union, Council Directive 2011/16/EU (3) has been the subject of a series of amendments over the last few years. In this context, Council Directive 2014/107/EU (4) introduced the Common Reporting Standard (‘CRS’) developed by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) for financial account information within the Union. The CRS provides for the automatic exchange of information on financial accounts held by non-tax residents and establishes a framework for that exchange worldwide. Directive 2011/16/EU was amended by Council Directive (EU) 2015/2376 (5), which provided for the automatic exchange of information on advance cross-border tax rulings, and by Council Directive (EU) 2016/881 (6), which provided for the mandatory automatic exchange of information on country-by-country reporting of multinational enterprises between tax authorities. In light of the use that anti-money-laundering information can have for tax authorities, Council Directive (EU) 2016/2258 (7) placed an obligation on Member States to give tax authorities access to customer due diligence procedures applied by financial institutions under Directive (EU) 2015/849 of the European Parliament and of the Council (8). Although Directive 2011/16/EU has been amended several times in order to enhance the means tax authorities can use to react to aggressive tax planning, there is still a need to reinforce certain specific transparency aspects of the existing taxation framework.

Member States find it increasingly difficult to protect their national tax bases from erosion as tax-planning structures have evolved to be particularly sophisticated and often take advantage of the increased mobility of both capital and persons within the internal market. Such structures commonly consist of arrangements which are developed across various jurisdictions and move taxable profits towards more beneficial tax regimes or have the effect of reducing the taxpayer's overall tax bill. As a result, Member States often experience considerable reductions in their tax revenues, which hinder them from applying growth-friendly tax policies. It is therefore critical that Member States' tax authorities obtain comprehensive and relevant information about potentially aggressive tax arrangements. Such information would enable those authorities to react promptly against harmful tax practices and to close loopholes by enacting legislation or by undertaking adequate risk assessments and carrying out tax audits. However, the fact that tax authorities do not react to a reported arrangement should not imply acceptance of the validity or tax treatment of that arrangement.

Considering that most of the potentially aggressive tax-planning arrangements span across more than one jurisdiction, the disclosure of information about those arrangements would bring additional positive results where that information was also exchanged amongst Member States. In particular, the automatic exchange of information between tax authorities...