March 2017, tax and business news

Business news

European Commission’s concerns about Romania’s economy

​Last month the European Commission sent a letter to the Romanian Finance Ministry expressing its concern regarding the inflation and budget deficit for 2017, in view of recent tax changes and salary increases in the State sector.

In line with all the formal statements made by the political leaders on this subject, the Romanian Finance Ministry answered that the assumed targets would be respected despite the recent financial evolutions.

But, some economic journalists presented few alarming indicators, among them a serious decrease of VAT cashing, comparing to last year, which cannot explained only by the decreasing of the quota from 24% to 20%.

Tax news

New tax registration requirements for non-resident persons

Starting 2017 a new informative tax statement was introduced: “Informative statement regarding the retained tax and exempted incomes from/of non-resident physical persons”, code 207. The deadline for depositing it is 28th of February for previous year.

The Romanian companies paying dividends, interest, royalties, commissions and services provided on Romania’s territory to non-resident physical persons must pay and declare the retaining tax taken from the gross incomes. The tax exempted incomes must be declared as well.

The most usual situations are:
– shareholders of Romanian companies receiving dividends, or interest for the loans granted;
– non-resident physical persons receiving commissions or fees for services provided on Romania’s territory.

The issue here is the fact this statement must declare the tax/exempted income individually, for each person, and requires to input the Romanian Tax Identification Number (TIN).

Consequently, every person in this situation will have to apply for and obtain such number.

The procedure is not very clear in this moment, but it seems that the application file is to be prepared and deposited by the Romanian company paying the income and retaining the tax.

The main important piece of the file is the document showing the relation of the non-resident person with the Romanian company and which proofs the necessity of obtaining the Romanian TIN:
– Trade Registry excerpt showing the fact the non-resident individual is shareholder of the Romanian company;
– The above one plus a copy of the loan agreement in the case of interest incomes etc.

Macroeconomic indicators

RON / EUR ex-rate evolution

31.12.2011: 4.3197

30.12.2012: 4.4287

31.01.2013: 4.4847

31.12.2014: 4.4821

31.12.2015: 4.5245

31.12.2016: 4.4511

31.01.2017: 4.5006

28.02.2017: 4.5115

Inflation rate evolution

2011: 5.79 %

2012: 3.33 %

2013: 3.98 %

2014: 1.07 %

2015: – 0.90%

2016: – 0.54%

Jan. 2017 / Jan. 2016: 0.05%

Key indicators

– VAT: 19%

– Profit tax: 16%

– Microenterprise tax: 3%

– Dividend tax: 5%

– Income tax: 16%

– Total salary taxes: cca 60-70% in addition to the negotiated net salary

– Minimum gross salary: 322 EUR

– Tax deductible loan interest rate:

– RON: 1.75%

– EUR: 4%

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