Original scientific paper
Direct Investments in Croatia in the Form of Personal Companies – Tax Related Issues
Marina Luketina
; Faculty of Management and Economics, Alpen-Adria-Universität Klagenfurt, Klagenfurt/Celovec, Austria
Abstract
The bilateral economic relations between Austria and Croatia are of prime importance to both countries: more than one quarter of foreign investments realised in Croatia stem from Austrian sources. Indeed, Austria is the largest investor in Croatia. Although the Croatian legal framework provides for several investment possibilities, Austrian residents prefer to invest in Croatian capital companies. However, especially from the perspective of Austrian residents, substantial tax benefits may result from the pursuit of entrepreneurial activities in the form of Croatian personal companies. This is mainly due to the different tax systems applied in Austria and Croatia that treat personal companies in fundamentally different ways. Nevertheless, diverging tax systems can trigger qualification and allocation conflicts in treaty law and may result in double (non-)taxation. The open questions are how to ascertain tax benefits despite these conflicts, i.e. how these conflicts can be solved by virtue of the double tax treaty concluded between Austria and Croatia. This paper illuminates the qualification and allocation conflicts which occur from participations of Austrian residents in Croatian personal companies and provides solutions for such conflicts. Moreover, the tax benefits resulting from investments in Croatian personal companies are identified and highlighted.
Keywords
Double Tax Treaty Austria-Croatia; Austrian Income Tax; Croatian Profit Tax; personal companies; limited partnerships; OECD Partnership Report
Hrčak ID:
176832
URI
Publication date:
6.3.2017.
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