Authors: Matheus Bueno de Oliveira, Frederico Silva Bastos
The globalization and internationalization of companies are phenomena that must be considered by today’s tax administrations. In many situations, such as tax evasion, harmful tax competition and money laundering, domestic statutes seem to be ineffective in a global dimension. To cope with these issues, new forms of regulations have emerged.
In the past, fiscal policies were established in each country solely for domestic troubleshooting. With globalization and the free movement of capital, there has been a push towards the interaction between different tax systems and tax administrations.
Due to this movement, an effort in signing new international treaties, conventions, and agreements seems to be a feasible solution to adopt common and harmonized standards. Considering this scenario, one realizes the importance of supranational bodies in the study and development of tax related exchange of information (EOI) initiatives and the formulation of proposals that can be implemented jointly by the international community.
Brazil is engaged in implementing an international standard of transparency and exchange of information on tax matters through its domestic legislation and institutional framework to support EOI policies, allowing availability and access to reliable information, as well as powers to obtain it under civil, commercial, tax, regulatory, and criminal laws, where necessary[1].
The country continues to expand on its tools for the exchange of information, including specialized networks and infrastructure along with some new international agreements which are in varying stages of negotiation and ratification.
This article examines some relevant topics of Brazil’s legal and institutional framework with regards to tax exchange of information, such as the Common Reporting Standards, Country-by-Country Report, the Brazilian Voluntary Disclosure Program, the Multilateral Convention on Mutual Administrative Assistance in Tax Matters and other EOI agreements, as well as Brazilian Supreme Court (STF) rulings regarding bank secrecy and the rights of Brazilian taxpayers vis-à-vis EOI.
