Draft amendment to income taxes from 1st January 2018 | SSW Tax Alert
A draft amendment to the law on corporate and personal income tax regulations has been published on the webpage of the Government Centre for Legislation. The amendment is expected to enter into force as early as 1st January 2018. The following summarises the most important proposed changes:
- distinguishing between corporate income tax (CIT) revenue sources for capital gains and other sources, while precluding the possibility of offsetting income from one of these sources against losses incurred in the other;
- altering the rules governing the payment of interest on debt financing – limiting the possibility to treat interest payable on finance as a tax cost regardless of the status of the entity providing such financing (a group entity, external financial institution, other external entity) up to 30% of the specifically-defined tax EBITDA. This restriction replaces the existing thin-capitalization rules;
- limiting the possibility to include expenses on intangible services (e.g. consultancy, accounting, market research, marketing, advertising) as a tax cost; the possibility will be limited to a value of PLN 1.2 million plus 5% of the tax base, increased by amortization rates and financial income, then reduced by financing costs;
- introducing a so-called Minimum Income Tax for taxpayers who own commercial property of considerable value. Commercial real estate whose initial value exceeds PLN 10 million shall be subject to income tax at a rate of 0.042% per month;
- changing the taxation of income generated through incentive schemes by including them within the applicable tax rates. The realisation of rights stemming from derivative financial instruments acquired as part of an incentive scheme will be treated as income derived from employment and shall be taxed according to the progressive tax rates (18% and 32%);
- precluding the possibility for natural persons to write-off amortization costs from assets received free-of-charge. It will no longer be possible to deduct depreciation costs from income tax in respect of assets received by way of donation
- modifying the rules applicable to Controlled Foreign Companies (CFCs) by changing the criteria applied to categorize a company as a CFC (i.e. lowering the currently applicable qualified income threshold for CFCs from 50% to 33% of the company's other income, introducing an effective income tax rate to replace the current nominal income tax rate and increasing the percentage of shares held from 25% to 50%).
The draft amendment to the income tax law is currently undergoing public consultations, which means that it may still be subject to significant modifications. We will keep you informed of any such modifications.
Please contact us if you are interested in discussing how the changes summarised above may impact on your business.
Authors:
Patrycja Goździowska, Partner, Tax Advisor
Tomasz Wickel, Partner, Legal Advisor
