Original title: Waiting List Data Exchange

FATCA is postponed by six months. The Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, drafted by Washington to combat US capital flight abroad, will officially take effect in July 2014 instead of January 1 of next year.

The postponement of the initial operational deadlines (see the accompanying table for the new "agenda") was officially announced last Friday by the IRS, the US tax administration, and is primarily due to the large number of countries that have requested to sign the bilateral agreement (Intergovernmental Agreement). This agreement provides simplified rules for operators in participating territories, subject to the translation of FATCA regulations into local law, thus eliminating potential challenges to the automatic exchange of information due to privacy concerns and/or internal restrictions. More than 80 "territories" are currently negotiating with the United States, in addition to the nine countries that have already signed the agreement. The IRS preferred to give everyone the opportunity to sign the bilateral pact with less pressure, believing that each additional country that joins offers a further opportunity to combat offshore tax evasion and improve global tax compliance. The postponement was also prompted by requests from operators, who repeatedly expressed the need for more time to complete the adaptation of their organizational standards, given the complexity of the regulations. With this in mind, the IRS has also decided to exclude 2013 data from the monitoring, and therefore will begin with reference to 2014 customers and accounts.

From an international perspective, the US FATCA represents the first real step toward multilateral data exchange (Global Information Reporting), and the strong pressure from the G8 and within Europe in recent months has increased interest in this model. The European Union is also ready to launch a similar project at the EU level, integrating it with the American one. However, it is clear at this point that the timetable proposed by the European Commission, which envisioned the start of identification activities starting January 6, 2015 (with reference to 2014 data), will also need to be revised. "It's hard to imagine," observes Davide Rotondo, executive director of PwC, "that just six months after the launch of US FATCA, operators will be able to evolve their systems toward multilateral trading, especially given the current regulatory uncertainty surrounding the latter, such as the confirmation of the regulatory framework, the subjective and objective scope, the methods for identifying tax residency, the procedures for conducting due diligence, and the penalties system. Unfortunately, given these unresolved aspects of multilateral trading, there is a certainty that there will be additional compliance costs for financial operators."

Italy finalized the technical agreement several months ago. Parliamentary ratification is pending, although the Ministry of Economy and Finance and the Revenue Agency are already working, with the input of industry associations, to finalize the implementing decree. The delay ordered by the IRS represents an opportunity to complete the required legislative process and to ensure that financial operators who have initiated the compliance plan will be able to complete it within the expected timeframe.

The due diligence deadlines for existing clients have also been extended by six months. The deadline for reporting data to the authorities has not changed: they must be received by September 2015. Yesterday's issue of Il Sole 24 Ore features the second installment of the investigation into the routes of capital fleeing the tax authorities.

source: il sole 24 ore