Partial annulment of annual tax on securities accounts 2.0 – opportunities to be seized?

On 27 October 2022, the Constitutional Court ruled on the constitutionality of the law of 17 February 2021 which introduced the new tax on securities accounts. Overall, the Court confirmed the validity of the new tax and maintained the application of the general anti-abuse measure.

However, the Court deemed that the retroactive effect of this general anti-abuse measure for actions/transactions that took place between 30 October 2020 and 25 February 2021 was unconstitutional. As a result, the Court decided to annul it. Therefore, only actions/transactions that took place after this period are in scope of this general anti-abuse measure. 

The Court also annulled the specific anti-abuse provision, which provided for the conversion of shares held in a securities account into registered financial instruments and the partial or total splitting of a securities account into several securities accounts. These actions were considered irrefutably abusive and, thus, in scope of the tax. 

In other words, the tax authorities may still consider the conversion of shares held in a securities account into registered financial instruments and the splitting of a securities account into several securities accounts to be abusive. However, taxpayers are now entitled to justify the reasons for their actions and to explain why they consider that the tax is not due (provided that it was not to circumvent the tax).

Taxpayers who have already paid the annual tax on securities accounts 2.0 because they are/were in scope of the aforementioned specific anti-abuse provision or because they carried out actions/transactions between 30 October 2020 and 25 February 2021 as they were considered to be in scope of the general anti-abuse measure should now consider asking for a reimbursement of the tax, if they have not already done so.

PwC Legal is at your disposal to assist you in this regard or to respond to any questions you might have.