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On September 17, 2021, The Dutch Minister of Finance informed the Dutch Parliament that the Netherlands together with Belgium, France, Italy and Spain has filed a non-paper at expert level with the European Commission.

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On September 17, 2021, on the website of the Dutch courts (De Rechtspraak) the opinion of Advocate-General Wattel in Case number: 21/00415, ECLI:NL:PHR:2021:769 was published. The taxpayer in the underlying case is a French Société anonyme (SA) with a Permanent establishment (PE) in the Netherlands. The assets of the Dutch PE include a.o. a shareholding in B NV. The taxpayer acquired this shareholding in 2007 by an exchange of shares and the issuing of convertible bonds. The exchanging shareholders in B could choose between newly to be issued shares in the SA or Obligations Remboursale en Actions (ORAs: convertible bonds) to be issued by the SA. The SA incurred costs of €9,424,557 with respect to the issuing of the ORAs and €34,700,000 with respect to the issuing of the new shares (hereafter together called “issuing costs”).

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On September 16, 2021 on the website of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) the judgment of the ECJ in Case C‑337/19 P, European Commission versus Kingdom of Belgium and Magnetrol International (ECLI:EU:C:2021:741), was published.

 

Summary

In today’s judgment, the Court of Justice notes that, for a state measure to be classified as an aid scheme, three cumulative conditions must be satisfied. First, aid may be granted individually to undertakings on the basis of an act. Secondly, no further implementing measure is required for that aid to be granted. Thirdly, undertakings to which individual aid may be granted must be defined ‘in a general and abstract manner’.

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On September 14, 2021, on the website of the Dutch courts a judgment of the District Court of The Hague (Rechtbank Den Haag) in Case AWB - 19 _ 7734 was published (ECLI:NL:RBDHA:2021:9742).

 

The taxpayer in the underlying case was incorporated on March 7, 2017 and is part of an international group that is active in the extraction of oil and gas. The taxpayer was incorporated to assume the central holding and financing function of the group. The taxpayer uses the Euro for both its annual accounts and tax purposes.

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Op 14 september 2021 is op de website van de Rechtspraak de uitspraak gepubliceerd van de Rechtbank Den Haag, in de zaak AWB - 19 _ 7734, (ECLI:NL:RBDHA:2021:9742). Belanghebbende in de onderhavige zaak is een Nederlandse vennootschap maakt onderdeel uit van een internationaal concern en is opgericht om de centrale houdster- en financieringsfunctie op zich te nemen. Zij voert als valuta de Euro, ook voor jaarrekening- en belastingdoeleinden. X B.V. is een USD-geldlening aangegaan om een Noorse vennootschap te financieren. De aankoopprijs van de Noorse deelneming is bepaald in USD. In de onderhavige casus is de vraag aan de orde of de inspecteur terecht een verzoek van de belastingplichtige tot toepassing van artikel 13, lid 7 van de vennootschapsbelasting heeft geweigerd.

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Op Prinsjesdag 2020 heeft de staatssecretaris van Financiën een onderzoek aangekondigd naar de wenselijkheid en vormgeving van een budgettair neutrale invoering van een vermogensaftrek in de vennootschapsbelasting. Op 13 september 2021 heeft de staatssecretaris de bevindingen van dit onderzoek naar de Tweede Kamer gestuurd. De belangrijkste conclusie van het onderzoek lijkt te zijn dat gaat worden afgewacht naar met welk voorstel/oplossing de Europese Commissie gaat komen en dat Nederland niet met een unilaterale oplossing gaat komen. (NB de Europese Commissie heeft in dit verband momenteel een open consultatie lopen)

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Op 9 September 2021 heeft het Europese Hof van Justitie (EHvJ) arrest gewezen in zaak C-406/20, Phantasialand tegen Finanzamt Brühl (ECLI:EU:C:2021:720). Het verzoek om een prejudiciële beslissing betreft de uitlegging van artikel 98, lid 2, van richtlijn 2006/112/EG van de Raad van 28 november 2006 betreffende het gemeenschappelijke stelsel van belasting over de toegevoegde waarde (PB 2006, L 347, blz. 1; hierna: „btw-richtlijn”), gelezen in samenhang met bijlage III, punt 7, bij deze richtlijn. Dit verzoek is ingediend in het kader van een geding tussen de vennootschap Phantasialand en het Finanzamt Brühl (belastingdienst Brühl, Duitsland; hierna: „belastingdienst”) over het tarief van de belasting over de toegevoegde waarde (btw) dat van toepassing is op de toegang tot het door deze vennootschap geëxploiteerde attractiepark.

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On September 9, 2021 on the website of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) the judgment of the CJEU in Case C‑449/20, Real Vida Seguros SA versus Autoridade Tributária e Aduaneira (ECLI:EU:C:2021:721), was published.

 

This request for a preliminary ruling concerns the interpretation of Articles 63 and 65 TFEU.

 

The request has been made in proceedings between Real Vida Seguros SA and the Autoridade Tributária e Aduaneira (Tax and Customs Authority, Portugal; ‘the tax authority’) concerning the partial deductibility of dividends attached to listed shares for the purposes of determining the basis of assessment for income tax.

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On September 9, 2021 on the website of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) the opinion of Advocate-General Tanchev in Case C‑9/20, Grundstücksgemeinschaft Kollaustraße 136 versus Finanzamt Hamburg-Oberalster (ECLI:EU:C:2021:730), was published.

 

This reference for a preliminary ruling concerns the proper point in time for a taxable person to deduct input VAT in respect of rental services supplied by a taxable person who uses cash accounting for VAT purposes.

 

More specifically, the taxable person who received the services in question claimed the corresponding input VAT deductions at the time the taxable person made payments to the supplier who also uses cash accounting for VAT purposes (‘cash method supplier’), in apparent accordance with Article 167 of the VAT Directive, read in conjunction with Article 66(b) of that directive. Those payments were in part made substantially later than the rental periods to which they related. The German tax authority subsequently claimed that the deductions should have been taken at the time of supply, that is to say when the rental property was made available to the taxpayer as recipient of the rental services.

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On September 3, 2021 on the website of the Dutch courts a judgment of the court of appeal of 's-Hertogenbosch (Gerechtshof 's-Hertogenbosch) in the joined cases 18/00721 upto and including 18/00732 and 18/00746 was published (ECLI:NL:GHSHE:2021:2629). The interested party in the underlying case is a German resident Immobilien-Sondervermögen that also invests in Dutch real estate. Under dispute is whether the Immobilien-Sondervermögen is liable for Dutch corporate income tax purposes and if so whether it is entitled to the benefits of the Dutch fiscal investment enterprise regime (fiscale beleggingsinstelling regime or short fbi-regime)?

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On September 6, 2021 the EU Tax Observatory published a report titled: “Have European banks left tax havens? Evidence from country-by-country data”.  In the report the EU Tax Observatory made an analysis which covers 36 systemic European banks. In the report it is stated that bank profitability in tax havens is abnormally high: EUR 238 000 per employee, as opposed to around EUR 65 000 in non-haven countries. According to the report this suggests that the profits booked in tax havens are primarily shifted out of other countries where service production occurs. According to the authors of the report around 25% of the profits made by the European banks in their sample are booked in countries with an effective tax rate lower than 15%.

Now I am not going to say that these 36 systemic European banks do not shift profits to low-taxed jurisdictions. However, my criticism on the report is that seems to be an one dimensional analysis. And by that I mean that the whole analysis is based on one criterion and that is the bank profitability per employee, which is set off against the effective tax rates in different jurisdictions. And by doing so, the report comes to the conclusions that the 36 systemic European banks use tax havens for their own benefit (to shift profits to low-tax jurisdictions and reduce their tax liabilities). And I really question whether by doing so, the report does not cut some corners to come to the conclusion which was desired by the authors?

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Op 3 september 2021 is op de website van de Rechtspraak de uitspraak gepubliceerd van het Gerechtshof ’s-Hertogenbosch van diezelfde datum, in de samengevoegde zaken 18/00721 tot en met 18/00732 en 18/00746, ECLI:NL:GHSHE:2021:2629. Belanghebbende in de onderhavige zaak is een in Duitsland gevestigd Immobilien-Sondervermögen dat mede belegt in Nederlandse onroerende zaken. In geschil is of belanghebbende in Nederland belastingplichtig is en of het fbi-regime van toepassing is. Het hof oordeelt dat belanghebbende is aan te merken als een doelvermogen en dus buitenlands belastingplichtig is voor de Nederlandse vennootschapsbelasting. Voor de fbi-status moet volgens het hof naar de totale activiteiten worden gekeken. Ten aanzien van de Nederlandse vastgoedprojecten is voldaan aan de beleggingseis. Voor de buitenlandse vastgoedprojecten acht het hof aannemelijk dat het EU-recht is geschonden, omdat de Belastingdienst feitelijk geen controle uitoefent bij Nederlandse fbi’s op hun buitenlandse vastgoedprojecten. Belanghebbende voldoet daarom volgens het hof aan het beleggingsvereiste.

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Op 2 september 2021 is op de website van de Rechtspraak een uitspraak gepubliceerd van de Rechtbank Den Haag van 29 juni 2021, AWB - 20 _ 5038, ECLI:NL:RBDHA:2021:9235. In de onderliggende uitspraak heeft de Rechtbank Den Haag beslist dat een online sportplatform geen recht heeft op het verlaagde btw-tarief zoals bedoeld in artikel 9, tweede lid, letter a, van de Wet OB en post b.3 van de bij deze wet behorende Tabel I.

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On August 12, 2021, on the website of the Dutch Courts a very interesting judgment of the District Court of Gelderland (Rechtbank Gelderland) in the joined cases, AWB-19_6602 and AWB-19_6603, ECLI:NL:RBGEL:2021:2972, was published. The cases concern the Dutch fiscal unity regime. Actually, the cases concern 2 questions. The first question is whether in the underlying case through a restructuring that a.o. includes a legal merger the taxpayer gains access to the possibility to set off pre-consolidation losses of a fiscal unity against profits that are allocable to the business of an entity that was only included in the fiscal unity after the losses were already incurred and that has disappeared through a legal merger that took place within the fiscal unity? Or does the fraus legis doctrine apply and is the taxpayer therefore denied the possibility to set off these pre-consolidation losses against the profits that are allocable to the business of the entity that has disappeared through the legal merger? The second question regarding which the District Court rules is whether based on the principles of sound business practices a taxpayer is obliged to amortize goodwill?

 

I find the case very interesting, because based on the judgment of the District Court of Gelderland it seems that in the underlying case the taxpayer has found a creative way to get access to pre-consolidation losses. Even although the Dutch legislation contains numerous provisions that are meant to avoid that the fiscal unity regime is abused to lower the Dutch tax burden. Several of these provisions specifically aim at avoiding that the fiscal unity regime is abused in order to get access to pre-consolidation losses and therewith lowering the amounts of Dutch corporate income tax (DCIT) due in later years. Since in the Netherlands losses can only be carried forward for a maximum of 6 years (6 financial years) the judgment can be of help in situations where a taxpayer is afraid that its losses are going to expire unused. Therefore this judgment might not only be interesting, but also very useful to taxpayers if the judgment of the District Court is ultimately confirmed by the Dutch Supreme Court. 

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On august 19, 2021 the HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) published new draft legislation that will require large businesses to notify HMRC where they have adopted an uncertain tax treatment , as defined by notification criteria set out in this draft legislation. This measure aims to highlight and clarify legal interpretation differences earlier, either through notification, or by encouraging more businesses to discuss areas of uncertainty with HMRC before they submit their returns, thereby negating the requirement to notify. Although not exclusive to large businesses, most of the legal interpretation tax gap is attributable to this taxpayer group.

 

The measure will apply to returns due to be filed on or after April 1, 2022. The legislation will apply the regime to Corporation Tax, Value Added Tax and Income Tax (for partnerships, and including amounts collected via PAYE).

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Op 13 augustus 2021 heeft staatssecretaris Vijlbrief de Tweede Kamer geïnformeerd dat de schriftelijke vragen van het lid Snels aan de staatssecretaris van Financiën over de cv/bv-structuur (2021Z13822, ingezonden 16 juli 2021) met het oog op een zorgvuldige en volledige beantwoording niet binnen de gebruikelijke termijn kunnen worden beantwoord.

 

Eerlijkheidshalve moeten wij toegeven dat wij deze schriftelijke vragen gemist hadden. De door Kamerlid Snels gestelde aanvullende vragen hebben betrekking op de ‘belastingontwijking’ door Pfizer waar Kamerlid Snels al eerder vragen over heeft gesteld. Over de antwoorden op de initiële vragen schreven wij al op 29 juni 2021 (Ambtelijke notitie meegezonden bij de antwoorden op Kamervragen over belastingontwijking door Pfizer).

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On August 6, 2021, on the website of the Dutch courts an interesting opinion of the Dutch Advocate General to the Dutch Supreme Court was published. Although nowadays we have the eurozone it will still regularly happen that taxpayers purchase assets for which the purchase price is denominated in another currency then the Euro. And often a purchase agreement will be entered into with respect to assets which will be delivered on a later date. In his very interesting opinion, the Advocate General sets out which facts influence how the question raised in the title is to be answered for Dutch corporate income tax purposes.

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Op 12 augustus 2021 is op De Rechtspraak de uitspraak van Rechtbank Gelderland in de zaken met  de zaaknummers: AWB - 19 _ 6602 en 19_6603, ECLI:NL:RBGEL:2021:2972 gepubliceerd. De zaak draait feitelijk om 2 vragen. De eerste vraag is of in de onderhavige casus de belastingplichtige middels een juridische fusie toegang krijgt tot de mogelijkheid om voorvoegingsverliezen te verrekenen? Een mogelijkheid tot verliesverrekening die zonder de juridische fusie niet zou hebben bestaan. Of dat het algemene leerstuk van fraus legis roet in het eten gooit? De tweede vraag is of een belastingplichtige op basis van de beginselen van goed koopmansgebruik verplicht is om af te schrijven over goodwill?

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Op 6 augustus is op De Rechtspraak de conclusie van Advocaat_Generaal Wattel in zaaknummer: 20/03943, ECLI:NL:PHR:2021:708 gepubliceerd. Belanghebbende heeft in 2014 een vliegtuig in US dollars gekocht. Het vliegtuig is in 2015 is geleverd. In 2014 heeft belanghebbende 20% van de prijs betaald, de rest betaalt zij bij levering. Op het moment van bestelling heeft zij het vliegtuig geactiveerd en de resterende betalingsverplichting gepassiveerd, beide tegen de valutakoers op dat moment. Ultimo 2014 is de dollar aangetrokken tegenover de euro, waardoor de resterende betalingsverplichting is gegroeid. De belanghebbende wil dit negatieve resultaat op basis van het voorzichtigheidsbeginsel fiscaal als verlies nemen in 2014.

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