Brussels, 13/06/2013 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission wants changes to be made in the European Union's savings tax deal with Switzerland, signed in 2005, to adjust it to international developments in the automatic exchange of information.
Swiss Finance Minister Eveline Widmer Schlumpf was sent a letter to this effect on Wednesday 12 June and EU Taxation Commissioner Algirdas Semeta will be in Berne on Monday to begin talks under the negotiating mandate granted to the European Commission by the Ecofin Council on 14 March to arrange measures equivalent to those to be introduced in the updated EU savings tax directive (due to be signed by the EU27 later this year) in the EU's savings tax agreements with Andorra, Liechtenstein, Monaco, San Marino and Switzerland.
The current EU savings tax agreement with Switzerland levies a deduction at source of 35% on interest on savings held in Swiss bank accounts by EU taxpayers. A quarter of the tax revenue remains in Switzerland and the remainder is sent to the country where the taxpayer is registered. Under the current agreement, only interest payments are taxed, but the EU wants the savings tax to also be levied on dividends on portfolios of shares held by taxpayers, along with any profit made when the shares are sold. The most difficult area of negotiation will be the idea of introducing into the tax deal the automatic exchange of information about bank accounts and assets held by European taxpayers in Swiss banks. Luxembourg and Austria made this a precondition for their signing the revised EU savings tax directive later this year and also a precondition for agreeing to the automatic exchange of information under that directive. In April 2013, the Swiss government said it was prepared to introduce the automatic exchange of information in 2015 as long as this becomes an international standard agreed to by all the big financial centres around the world, as recommended by the OECD and G20. The Commissioner is therefore hopeful that progress can be rapidly reached. (FG/transl.fl)