14 March 2018 Council of the EU reaches agreement on new mandatory transparency rules for intermediaries and taxpayers The Council of the European Union (the Council and the EU, respectively) reached a political agreement on March 13, on the draft Directive amending Directive 2011/16/EU regarding the mandatory automatic exchange of information in the field of taxation in relation to reportable cross-border arrangements (the Amendment). While the overall objective of the Amendment is to provide EU Member States with an additional tool with which to tackle perceived tax avoidance and aggressive tax planning, the Amendment leaves those terms undefined, instead imposing a new obligation on EU-based tax consultants, banks, lawyers, and other intermediaries to disclose any cross-border arrangement that contains one or more features or "hallmarks," if they are identified as intermediaries for the purposes of the Amendment. Document ID: 2018-0560 |
