On Thursday 2 February, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) partially annulled the European Commission’s decision to order the repayment of tax benefits granted to economic interest groupings (EIGs) under the ‘Spanish tax lease system’ (STLS).
The European Commission’s decision followed several complaints about the application of the STLS to certain finance lease agreements. The complainants pointed out that the mechanism allowed shipping companies to benefit from a price reduction of 20-30% for the purchase of ships built by Spanish shipyards, to the detriment of sales from shipyards in other Member States, because the EIGs transferred part of the benefits obtained through the STLS to those shipping companies that had purchased a new ship.
The European Commission, on the other hand, was of the opinion that three of the five tax measures forming the STLS constituted state aid that was partially incompatible with the internal market. It then ordered the national authorities to recover the aid granted from the investors, i.e. the members of the EIGs.
In its judgment on Thursday, the CJEU found that the European Commission erred in law by designating the investors in EIGs as the sole beneficiaries of the aid in question, since it had itself found that the STLS constituted a tax scheme intended to confer an advantage not only on EIGs, but also on shipping companies.
Consequently, the Court annuls part of the European Commission’s decision, namely the fact that it designates the EIGs and their investors as the sole beneficiaries of the aid in question and, subsequently, that it orders the recovery of the full amount of the aid exclusively from the investors in the EIGs.
See the judgment: https://aeur.eu/f/56k (Original version in French by Damien Genicot)