Keywords
Summary

Keywords

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Freedom of movement for persons ° Freedom of establishment ° Tax legislation ° Right to exemption from tax on transactions relating to immovable property in connection with a reorganization within a group of companies ° Right reserved to companies acquiring immovable property from a company constituted under national law ° Not permissible

(EEC Treaty, Arts 52 and 58; Council Directive 77/799)

Summary

Articles 52 and 58 of the Treaty preclude the law of a Member State from restricting exemption from the tax on transactions relating to immovable property, which is normally payable in connection with a reorganization within a group of companies only to cases where the company liable for tax acquires immovable property from a company constituted under national law, and refusing to grant such relief where the transferor is a company constituted under the law of another Member State.

The fact that the sale of immovable property gives rise to the payment of tax increases the cost of the transaction to the purchaser, and is passed on in the price likely to be obtained by the vendor. Where the latter is a company established in another Member State which transfers property forming part of the capital used in connection with its permanent establishment in the territory of the Member State where such legislation applies, it will be in a less favourable position than if it had operated in the latter State by creating a subsidiary there which would have fulfilled the conditions giving right to exemption.

Although the difference in treatment has only an indirect effect on the position of companies constituted under the law of other Member States, it constitutes discrimination on grounds of nationality which is prohibited by Article 52 of the Treaty because a company exercising the right given to it by Article 58 of the Treaty to carry on business in another Member State through the intermediary of a branch or agency is at a disadvantage compared with companies constituted in accordance with the law of that Member State.

Such discrimination cannot be justified by the difficulties encountered by the national authorities in checking equivalence between the forms in which national companies may be constituted and those of other Member States, since the information necessary for that purpose can be obtained with a view to imposing the tax in question by means of the system provided for by Directive 77/799 concerning mutual assistance by the competent authorities of the Member States in the field of direct and indirect taxation.