In a case decided by the Supreme Tax Court, an application submitted to the Portuguese tax authorities before 1 April 2020 led to a ten-year tax exemption of the pension income for a taxpayer who had permanently moved to Portugal However, in order to prevent a double non-taxation in such cases Germany has agreed a subject-to-tax clause with Portugal if such income is not taxed in Portugal.
The subject-to-tax provision of the Parent-Subsidiary Directive, whereby distributed dividends are exempt from withholding tax, requires that the dividends are taxed in the hands of the parent company. In practice, this necessitates actual payment of the tax.
The correction of a final tax assessment notice pursuant to Section 50d (8) sentence 2 of the German Income Tax Act is only possible if – contrary to the provision in the double tax treaty - the employment income of an unlimited taxpayer has been wrongly included in the income tax assessment by omitting to produce proper documentation as required in Section 50d (8) Income Tax Act. It follows from this decision of the Supreme Tax Court that the possibilities of amending tax assessment under Section 50d (8) sentence 2 Income Tax Act are strictly limited and only apply in exceptional cases.
On 24 June 2026, the European Commission published two packages aimed at simplifying various corporate tax directives. The first package, a so-called “Tax Omnibus Package” proposes changes to the Parent-Subsidiary Directive, the Interest and Royalties Directive, and the Merger and Dispute Resolution Directives. The second package is intended to serve as a “DAC Recast,” under which certain thresholds for reporting obligations will be modified or abolished, corporate groups subject to Pillar 2 will generally be exempted from DAC6, and other amending directives related to DAC (the Mutual Assistance Directive) will be adapted or consolidated. The packages are designed to modernise the EU's direct tax framework, make it more efficient and better adapt it to the current economic environment, whi ...
In a recent ruling, the Münster Tax Court had to decide on the income tax and treaty law treatment of a severance payment received by the plaintiff as a soldier in the British armed forces
An employer's certificate is sufficient for the proof of taxation of wages in India in order to claim tax exemption under the relevant terms of the Double Tax Treaty between Germany and India. The submission of an official income tax assessment notice is not mandatory for claiming the exemption under the subject-to-tax clause of the German Income Tax Act.
The distribution of profits by a Luxembourg subsidiary (in the legal form of a SARL) to its German parent company (a partnership limited by shares – KGaA) may be an abuse of legal forms where the KGaA provided SARL with a loan and shortly thereafter waived repayment, thereby putting SARL in a position to actually make the profit distribution. Even more when the losses arising from the impairment of the value of SARL because of the distribution are to be used by the shareholders in a tax-effective manner.
Corporations with at least a 25% share in a Société d'investissement à capital variable (SICAV), a Luxembourg investment company, do not have to pay income tax in Germany on the dividends received from the SICAV in 2010. This also applies if the Luxembourg tax authorities – for whatever reason - did not exercise their right of taxation at source and the distributions hence remained untaxed.
According to various statements of the German Finance Minister Olaf Scholz on 22 May 2019, a system of international minimum taxation will be discussed at the forthcoming G20 (June 2019) and G7 (August 2019) meetings. The aim is to agree such a system (within the terms of the Global Anti-Base Erosion "GloBE" agenda and given the name “BEPS 2.0”) with the other 128 states of the OECD in the Summer of 2020.
The Federal Finance Ministry circular of 12 November 2014 on the taxation of salaries for tax treaty purposes has been revised by a committee made up of from both the Federal and the States’ governments.
The finance ministry has issued a decree on the application of subject to tax rules in treaties where taxation in the state of source is not immediate or full.
