(October 15, 2014)

The Council of the European Union released a press release announcing that during the October 2014 ECOFIN meeting, the EU Member States agreed on a proposal to revise the Directive on Administrative Cooperation (Council Directive 2011/16/EU). According to the press release the Council agreed on a draft directive extending the mandatory automatic exchange of information between tax administrations, thereby enabling them to better combat tax evasion and to improve the efficiency of tax collection.

The proposal brings interest, dividends and other income, as well as account balances and sales proceeds from financial assets, within the scope of the automatic exchange of information. It thus amends directive 2011/16/EU on administrative cooperation in the field of direct taxation.

The text will be adopted at a forthcoming Council meeting without further discussion, once it has been finalized in all official languages.

In a different press release the European Commission states that in practice, this means that, from 2017, Member State tax authorities will automatically exchange information with each other on most categories of income and capital held by private individuals and certain entities. Furthermore the European Commission states that it was agreed that Austria would be given an additional year to apply the new rules, to allow it sufficient time to make the necessary technical adaptations. However, Austria also committed to consult with industry to see if it would be possible for it to start applying this wide scope automatic exchange earlier than 2018.

Interested in the current text of Council Directive 2011/16/EU? Then click here.

For further information click here to be forwarded to a press issued by the Council of the European Union, which will open in a new window.

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