Commission launches work on establishing a Capital Markets Union

The European Commission has  kicked off its project to create a Capital Markets Union (CMU) for all 28 EU Member States with a first orientation debate at the College of Commissioners. The European Commissioner for Financial Services, Jonathan Hill, has today, 18th of February 2015, launched a green paper on Capital Markets Union. This is a multi-pronged effort to ease money flow to business and address Europe’s over-reliance on bank finance. These could include reviving market appetite for securitised bundles of loans, cutting red tape for businesses raising equity or debt, and perhaps better coordinating tax and insolvency rules underpinning markets. Capital Markets Union could deliver an efficiency gain of €60 billion to businesses across the EU, according to the European Parliament.

The CMU is one of the flagship projects of this Commission and ties in with the ambition to boost jobs and growth in the EU. It is designed to help businesses to tap into diverse sources of capital from anywhere in the EU and offer investors and savers additional opportunities to put their money to work. It aims to create a single market for capital for all 28 Member States by removing barriers to cross-border investment and lower costs of funding within the EU. Well-functioning capital markets will also facilitate the mobilisation of private financing in the context of the Investment Plan for Europe.

Green Paper – Building a Capital Markets Union 18.2.2015

New measures to tackle corporate tax avoidance

EU Commission presents Tax Transparency Package

The European Commission presented a package of tax transparency measures on 18th of March 2015 as a part of its ambitious agenda to tackle corporate tax avoidance and harmful tax competition in the EU. A key element of this Tax Transparency Package is a proposal to introduce the automatic exchange of information between Member States on their tax rulings.

Corporate tax avoidance is thought to deprive EU Member States’ public budgets of billions of euros a year. It also undermines fair burden-sharing among tax-payers and fair competition between businesses. Companies rely on the complexity of tax rules and the lack of cooperation between Member States to shift profits and minimise their taxes. Therefore, boosting transparency and cooperation is vital in the battle against aggressive tax planning and abusive tax practices.

The Tax Transparency Package aims to ensure that Member States are equipped with the information they need to protect their tax bases and effectively target companies that try to escape paying their fair share of taxes.