What is DAC 6?
Council Directive (EU) 2018/822 (the "Directive" and "DAC6") imposes a new obligation on EU based "intermediaries" (as well as taxpayers in certain circumstances) to report on certain "cross-border arrangements" containing features which are considered to be indicative of potential aggressive tax planning. The intermediaries must report details of the arrangements to their local tax authorities which in turn are obliged to exchange the information with all other EU tax authorities.
The scope of the regime is wide and will require intermediaries to implement new processes and procedures to assess the transactions on which they act, advise or assist and be in a position to report on an ongoing basis.
The European Commission has recently proposed deferring DAC 6 reporting by at least 3 months as a result of the COVID-19 outbreak and reporting by intermediaries should not now commence until after 1 October 2020 (see further below). However, transactions since 25 June 2018 (the date of the Directive) remain in scope and will need to be reviewed and assessed.
The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances.
