Newsletter DHP Legal News 2|2018
27.04.2018Company: Eversheds Sutherland, advokátní kancelář, s.r.o.
The latest edition of DHP LEGAL NEWS 2|2018 has just been published, containing important news in Czech and Slovak law.
Mountain guides
Under the Criminal Code, a lawyer is required to prevent a client from evading tax. According to the amendment to the Tax Code, attorneys are required to pass on information obtained from their own AML procedures to financial authorities. The pressure to break confidentiality is increasing. On the one hand we understand. Attorneys do not want to be party to any form of dishonesty. On the other hand, we must defend ourselves. Our profession is sort of like being a mountain guide. We set out with clients on various paths through a legal wilderness, and we don't always have reliable maps. Some paths are unacceptable to us; we simply will not take them. But informing the authorities about what we talked about with clients during the trek or when planning it is foreign to our profession. The draft European directive takes a different approach. In general, it requires "intermediaries" to report cross-border tax driven structures. But he who has a legal duty of confidentiality instructs his client, who subsequently bears this obligation on his own. This is a better approach and hopefully it will not be lost upon being transposed into Czech law.
Stanislav Dvořák
Main news:
CZ: Notification of crossborder tax driven structures
SK: The end of investment arbitration?
CZ: Implementation of the ATAD Directive into the Czech tax laws
Tags: Law |
