CJEU – Recent Developments in Direct Taxation 2019

1. S. 178Introduction

The first Finnish case, Metirato Oy, in liquidation (C‑695/17) concerned the interpretation of Council Directive 2010/24/EU of 16 March 2010 concerning mutual assistance for the recovery of claims relating to taxes, duties and other measures. The Directive has a wide scope since it covers assistance between the Member States for the recovery of any claims covered by the Directive.

Tax case law is predominately created by administrative courts in Finland. Notwithstanding this main rule, the District Court of Helsinki made a request for a preliminary ruling to the CJEU concerning cross-border recovery of tax claims. It asked the CJEU whether the requested state or the requesting state should be the defendant in restitution proceedings following mutual assistance under Directive 2010/24/EU. The district court is a civil law court that was dealing with an insolvency case. Civil law litigation may – as in the case before the CJEU – sometimes have links to the domain of procedural tax law.

The second Finnish case E (C-480/19) concerns the taxation of revenue received by a Finnish individual from a Luxembourg based SICAV fund. The Supreme Administrative Court of Finland made ...