CJEU – Recent Developments in Value Added Tax 2019

S. 1541. Introduction

1.1. The aim of the transactions, Direct link, The Right to Dispose of Goods as Owner, The Single supply

The main, overarching theme of this contribution

The main theme of this contribution is related to the theme common to many of the Court of Justice’s cases in 2019, namely whether the (economic) aim of more comprehensive transactions or the consitituting transaction elements should play a role in determining the nature of the transaction for VAT purposes. This is an important question in order to assess whether the transaction at hand consists for VAT of one or more transactions. Before we can discuss the individual cases, we will first discuss the various options for determining whether transactions are connected in such a way that they should be deemed to constitute a single supply for VAT purposes. The role of the (economic) aim that the parties assign to these transactions will be discussed afterwards. We will however start with a few short remarks on the relevant concepts: “Direct link”, “The Right to Dispose of Goods as Owner” and the “Single supply”.

Direct link

A discourse on the taxability of transactions for VAT will soon reveal that transactions are only ta...