FISCAL REFORMS MASSIMILIANO SAMMARCO - For Italy that of fiscal and economic reforms is not only a necessity that can no longer be postponed, it is a great challenge and a knot to untie for the future of the country.

The necessary fiscal revolution for Italy

The tax revolution we are proposing should move on the dual public-private track. The public intervenes in major works, while the private enters with its entrepreneurial activities in support of the State and to carry out innovative industrial projects that create jobs and culture and redistribute wealth among citizens. Exceptional measures and choices are urgently needed to definitively transform Italy into a modern nation and at the height of its possibilities.

Simple bureaucracy, fair taxation, incentives and aid to companies both on the national and international market, tax friendly, possibility of interacting with any bureaucratic apparatus of the State, The aim of the Commission’s proposal is to introduce clear rules and regulations with a view to modifying the guidelines and rules according to the new market situation.

These reforms must not look to the immediate, to the present, but to a future development with an inclusive productive vision (a slow reform - step by step - but constant over time, that completely changes the roots of the tax system). The inspiring principle is that of investment, the state that does what the company alone can not do and that promotes innovation: if I attract activity in the territory with short-term tax incentives, in the long term I will create an economic induced growth and wealth (not only economic but above all cultural). With such a structured plan foreign companies can also decide to settle in Italy.

Aid to undertakings and infrastructure

Companies are looking for optimal conditions to be able to invest and produce: they need incentives for those who hire, for those who bring new technology to the territory; they need a different taxation, with lower rates than ordinary ones, for those who sell on the international market; it serves the possibility to operate also like a holding company of participation for all own branches in the world and therefore also in this case with a different treatment regarding the normal taxation of the dividends received from foreign branches.

And then again: infrastructure and connections are crucial for the economic growth of a geographical area. From the first January 2018 there is a law in force in Italy that regards the economic Special zone, that it interests all the ports of the South Italy, written and realized on the models of the free zones of Barcelona, Rotterdam, Suez; but nobody knows and the most serious thing is that nobody does anything to carry out these projects.

An enlightened State must also simply understand why a company moves its headquarters abroad and then try to recreate in Italy those same conditions - or even better - economic-legal that the company has found abroad. If then in Italy we really thought about lowering taxes, with a fairer tax scheme, we would help solve the problem of black and evasion and would leave more resources to private consumers to boost consumption: with lower rates, everyone pays and the state collects more!

COMPANY RELOCATIONS - A proposal for reform from below, written by workers for workers, which in its assumptions responds to a seemingly elementary but not recognized principle: "Relocating a company in good health, transferring its production abroad for the sole purpose of increasing the profit of shareholders, does not constitute free exercise of private economic initiative, but an act contrary to the right to work, protected by art. 4 of the Constitution".

The bill was signed by 26 MPs

This is a proposal for a law that aims to have a decisive impact on the abuse of companies. And to provide real and concrete tools to protect jobs in a market increasingly wild and dominated by multinationals that in recent months have accustomed to mass redundancies and closures of entire production plants overnight. An implicit sign that the workers have no particular expectations towards the so-called "decree against relocations" proposed to the government by 5 Stars and Democratic Party. A rule from which the draft has disappeared any reference to sanctions against companies that do not respect the agreements, and therefore - even in the event of approval - risks not serving almost anything.

It risks being of no use, above all because this is not the way to maintain and encourage foreign investment in Italy; threatening is useless!

To prevent the relocation of companies you need to attract!

We have a great challenge ahead for Italy; fiscal and economic reforms are also a great challenge in the great challenge.

The focus of this tax reform is the dual track of the public and the private. The public intervenes in major projects. The private sector enters with its entrepreneurial activities in support of the public but also to realize innovative industrial projects that create jobs, help culture and redistribute wealth among citizens.

Considering the critical and tragic situation in which we find ourselves, extraordinary measures and reforms are being proposed to transform Italy into a country equal to its possibilities.

These reforms must look not to tomorrow but to a development of decades to the future with a modern, inclusive and productive vision.

The guiding principle is investment. If I attract activity on the territory with fiscal incentives in the short term, in the long term I create an economic induced of growth and wealth. Not only economic but above all cultural.

With such a structured plan, even foreign companies can decide not only to settle in Italy but also not to go away!

The situation in Italy

Since 1987, the OECD has been telling Italy that our tax burden was too high, that we had the world record for the number of laws and the number of laws. That our bureaucracy was a jungle! It’s been a long time since 1987, but things have not improved and I would say maybe worse.

In the other Western countries we hear a single voice and music. Simple bureaucracy, fair taxes, incentives and aid to companies both on the national and international market. The true fiscal friend, the possibility of interacting with any apparatus and level of the State, clear regulations and immediate flexibility to change guidelines and rules according to the new situations that arise in the market.

Reform

In Italy we are unable to move forward on the reforms and the great revolution of the administrative apparatus. We must create the conditions to be central and a point of reference also in international economic operations as other nations do. Companies are looking for optimal conditions where they can invest and produce.

Incentives that can be given for the fact of hiring local staff, for the fact that it brings new technology and know-how to the territory. Because sales then made on the international market can be taxed differently and therefore with lower rates than the standard rate. Because I am allowed to operate also as a holding company of participation in all its branches in the world and therefore also here with different treatment regarding the normal taxation of dividends received from foreign branches etc etc… (here the list of possible reform actions are really endless!) Again: infrastructure and connections are fundamental for the economic and entrepreneurial growth of a geographical area.

From the first January 2018 there is a law in force in Italy that regards the Economic Zone special that regards all the ports of the south of Italy written and realized on the models of the free zones of Barcelona, Rotterdam, Suez etc etc. but nobody almost knows and the most serious thing is that nobody does anything to carry out these projects! A law made and written very well, but in reality it does not apply to the incompetence and disinterest of the parties involved. Let us think of the inducements that could be created by making such an initiative run smoothly.

So either we reform nothing or if we do then we do not apply!

The difficulties of fighting the wild relocations of companies

There is NO will to carry forward the great structural changes that our nation needs! The NON WILL is a symptom of ignorance (in the purely Latin meaning of the word that is of the one who does not know) and therefore of fear of facing change.

It is also of fundamental importance to try to keep Italian companies in our territory. Not to let them escape abroad and this is done exactly as I just stated above.

An example for all: I remember the FCA case that moved the headquarters from Turin to London and Amsterdam. When FCA FIAT finally became a private company thanks to Marchionne, it began to study and verify where it could have more legal-fiscal-economic advantages than Italy. Made the change and the transfer of the center, immediately all in Italy against Marchionne that had become a traitor of the fatherlands etc etc!!! An enlightened state would simply have tried to understand why the company was relocating its headquarters abroad. Then simply try to recreate in Italy those same economic-legal conditions (or better) that FIAT FCA had found abroad.

Only punishment and threat are of little use!

READ ALSO-> Maximilian Sammarco and the location of tax havens on Russia

WHIRLPOOL NAPOLI ZES - Also on this occasion the Italian Government is not able to behave in an intelligent, careful and innovative way. As always, the complete knowledge and knowledge of the economic reality in which we live is lacking; what is the use only of showing only the muscles without a strategy for the future? Considering also that I don’t think the Whirlpool will be impressed by that type of muscles (if we want to call them really muscles).

Whirlpool Naples, necessity of the ZES in order to resolve

I have always written that it is of fundamental importance to try to keep foreign companies in our territory and not to make them flee abroad. I do not repeat myself here about the very high tax and labour costs we have in Italy.

An enlightened state in this situation should simply try to understand why the company is laying off and perhaps moving its headquarters abroad (Slovenia to be precise where it has a whole series of tax incentives)and then simply try to recreate in Italy those same economic-legal conditions that exist in other countries more attractive from the point of view of tax, bureaucratic , etc.

Things to do

1. Create incentives for hiring workers and therefore do not charge all the cost of the worker to the enterprise.
2. Possibility for the shareholder to set up in Italy financial and industrial holding companies (group leader) - SPI- with the following advantages and conditions (therefore the same Whirlpool):

• SPI’s income from activities outside Italy (excluding tax havens) is exempted as follows:
• Dividends
• Interest
• Capital gains
• Canons
• There could also be a specific rule for foreign managers who move to Italy to work for the SPI - so they have never been resident in Italy before - which sets a fixed rate, for example, 15% for 4 years on all the income they received as natural persons both in Italy and abroad.
  
  

With regard to the distribution of profits from the SPI to the foreign shareholder, no withholding tax will be provided regardless of the regulatory provisions of the conventions to avoid double taxation signed.

3. to operate definitively and quickly the ZES Naples and therefore to give the possibility to the Whirlpool to operate directly in the same ZES.

Therefore to make finally executive the Law that has created the Economic Special Zones for the ports of the South in order to put in competition with the ports like Rotterdam, Barcelona, Suez.. etc etc . This special zones allow you to operate with convenient tax incentives and therefore can attract foreign investment; the Whirlpool from this area could sell its products in the international market with huge tax advantages.

All this would allow Whirlpool to continue working in Italy and not to lay off.

AMERICAS CANADA CHILE - In relation to the recent tragic events we really have to ask ourselves what to do in the coming years. Why not look at the Americas from Canada to Chile? A huge territory, a huge market with an infinite potential for economic development and with a community of Italian origin vast with traditions, culture, history and mentality equal to ours.

Why join the Americas market, from Canada to Chile

We should start with a strong and forward-looking foreign policy to make even more trade agreements and sign free trade treaties with most of the American nations.

First of all, with the USA, and that is to create a de facto single market without customs duties. Maintaining, at first, control over food and pharmaceuticals.

Then with Chile in Latam exactly the same thing. A free trade treaty so that we will automatically find ourselves in the single market of the Pacific Alliance (Chile, Peru, Colombia and Mexico). Then with Argentina and Mercosur (Uruguay, Paraguay and Brazil). With these countries create, at a later stage, a Task Force for investment and development for all countries, including Central America.

Thus become a single market with the Americas and thus move freely between the two continents. Exchange of technology, exchange of professionals in business management, Joint Ventures, trade agreements, mergers, movement of people, skilled workers, professionals and enterprises and capital. Universities that join forces and make agreements on joint research and development. Possibility of free movement of students from one faculty to another with automatic validity of titles.

Support from Spain, Portugal and Greece?

In this economic development project, Spain could be our European partner (I think it is useless to explain why) but Portugal and Greece could also join.

Bring back as much as possible all the industrial production that we have left to China and bring it back to this new market with incentives and tax reliefs.

Moreover this economic alliance so constituted could have like head row Italy and Spain for the development and the investments in Africa. With the Mediterranean as the main entrance.

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USE CASH RESTRICTION - The new restriction of the use of cash fixed at 1000 euro and then raised to 2000 euro. IT’S NOT TO FIGHT EVASION BUT IT ONLY AFFECTS THE LOWER-MIDDLE CLASS, YOUNG AND OLD!

Restriction on the use of cash to combat tax evasion. Effective tool?

To combat evasion, we need other systems and procedures that are always the result of a profound tax reform as we propose!

Quick reflections on the point:

• large evaders, mafia, traffickers etc etc do not have the problem of the 2000 euro of cash.
• There is no European legislation that imposes this limit (indeed many EU countries have no limit ).
• The check must be made in advance but the method of payment must be left free.
• Moreover, not limiting the use of cash for payments is also a way to turn a part of the economy thinking in the first place of payments made by younger and older people.

Alternative solution

DEDUCTION OF ALL COSTS - Possibility for any subject to deduct all expenses and costs such as receipts, invoices, tickets etc, etc of any kind, even not related to the activities carried out by the same subjects. For example, an employee may deduct a plumber’s bill as an expense. If I can deduce I definitely ask for the invoice and the plumber issues it and pays VAT and taxes.

With this system becomes irrelevant the means of payment because I realized the control upstream. The impression is that this measure is more punitive and demagogic and the practical effects will have very little effect for what it is proposed for, namely the fight against evasion!

But do you really think that this way we can stop the big evaders, the mafia, the traffickers etc etc? The struggle without borders and piety must be made to the recycling of large international transactions. There you have to intervene, block the tax havens, hit the mob mix - economy. A modern state must focus on these points!

Make everything billable

You have to go upstream, understand our real situation: lower taxes, make deductible expenses and costs etc etc. In other words when we created a system in which everything is billed with the possibility of deducting for everyone, the payment system becomes the least important thing! Considering that, however, to date, in the current situation the limit of 2000 euros is a ridiculous measure, inadequate and "affects" only honest people who work and produce in the healthy circuit of our economy and therefore also affects the economy itself!

The thing that irritates most is that the mobsters and the big evaders are having a big laugh about this limit of 2000 euros!

LEGGI ANCHE ---> EXPO ROME 2023

ZES SPECIAL ECONOMIC ZONE - In various Countries of the world the ZES are used for years, some have even almost "institutionalized" such instrument, extending it to great part of the national territory. But what exactly is the ZES?

ZES: Special Economic Zone

The ZES (Special Economic Zone) is in fact a "weapon" in order to be able to entice enterprises to invest in a territory offering fiscal incentives, bureaucratic facilitations and in order to attenuate the cost of the job. To all this must be added the proximity and availability of an efficient and effective infrastructure system located in the immediate vicinity. Generally an airport, a port, with railways and roads within easy reach.

With Law L.12 August 2017 n.123 is introduced in Italy for all the ports of the South. But once the law has been made little has been done (indeed I would say nothing) to encourage and stimulate the creation and the birth of these Zones that could attract a lot of national and international investments. Apart from the issue of tax savings for businesses, we think only of Italy’s position in the Mediterranean.

For example the ZES interests 14 of the 550 municipalities of the Campania and the interested surfaces are extended in prevailing measure in the retroportuali zones of Naples and Salerno, in order to be projected punctually in the more internal truths like Marcianise, Nola and Acerra.

We understand the operation of the SEZ

In order to understand well the operation of the ZES we see to example as they are structured the ZES to Rotterdam and Tangier.

ROTTERDAM  

The Harbour Authority of Rotterdam covers the role of precursor. Draft of portxl, an incubator of innovative start-ups with a program of activity centralized specifically on the port and the industries connected to the Dutch harbour port of call. The new incubator aims to research new companies in the fields of transport and logistics, energy, chemistry, refining and maritime transport. With portxl you can discover start-ups and connect them with leading companies by introducing them into a vast network of industry experts. With this plan the port can attract a greater number of innovative activities in the region and to show what it has to offer.

the strategy adopted from the port of Rotterdam delineates a new distance of increase of the port of call, not more seen like mere infrastructure, but like fulcrum of economic activities, not only of logistic type and trasportistico, but that project the country towards new goals of innovation and "smart". The first 10 years are paid very low direct taxes.

TANGER MED 

It is located in a strategic position 14 km from Spain and on the way between Asia, Europe and America; it is surrounded by a free zone of industrial and logistic activities. Tanger Med is not only port: it is a logistic and industrial platform of intercontinental level entirely managed from the Tanger Med special Agency (TMSA).

Tanger Med is also a Large Industrial Platform (GIP) that includes:

-a logistics free zone (MedHub) providing for tax and customs advantages. In 2016 after Adidas and 3M also Decathlon decided to settle here occupying an area of over 20 thousand square meters of warehouses, which will make the logistics center of Decathlon in Tangier the second largest in the world, after that of Singapore, handling all goods destined for the Asian markets;

-an industrial free zone (Tanger Free Zone), an export-oriented multipurpose free zone with 650 companies and 50000 workers;

-a platform dedicated to the automotive sector (Tanger Automotive City) that includes the industrial complex "Renault-Nissan", one of the most important investments in the Mediterranean, that it manages also the Terminal vehicles of the port. There are also a hundred international suppliers (Denso, Leoni, Delphi, Sumitomo etc.), which make Morocco the largest manufacturer of vehicles in the MENA region.

There is also an area dedicated to offshoring activities (Tetouan Shore) which is an outsourcing of call center services and which represents a call to European nearshoring with an area of 28 hectares, a total investment of 120 million euros and the creation of a total of 12 thousand jobs.

Customs procedures

Tanger Med provides special customs, administrative and social procedures:

• exemption from registration and stamp duties for the increase or injection of capital and acquisitions of land;
• exemption from patent tax and urban tax for 15 years;
• exemption of corporate income tax for 5 years and, after that, reduced rate to 8.75% up to 20% year;
• tax exemption on equity products, shares and similar income and on the repatriation of capital;
• goods entering the area, as well as services rendered by the territory, are exempt from VAT;
• for certain sectors, the State, through the Hassan II Fund, may grant financial aid for the purchase of land and/or the construction of production units. This concession reaches up to 100% of the price of the land based on a maximum cost of 250 DH/sqm. This aid shall be granted within a period not exceeding 60 days following the submission of the supporting documents;
• The social security treatment for recruitment and employment contracts allows a significant reduction in labour costs.

The entrepreneurial establishment is also facilitated by the presence of new infrastructures, ample spaces for working the goods and efficient road, railway and airport connections.

The ZES - Special Economic Zone of Italy

In ITALY here is the rule: Tax benefit provided by art.5 of L.12 August 2017 n.123.

Tax credit

Art.5 co.2

In relation to the investments carried out in the ZES, the tax credit referred to in article 1, paragraphs 98 and following, of law 28 December 2015 n. 208, is proportionate to the share of the total cost of the assets acquired by 31 December 2020 in the maximum limit, for each investment project, EUR 50 million. The provisions referred to in the same article 1, paragraphs 98 and following, of Law No. 208 of 28 December 2015 shall apply mutatis mutandis.

The benefiting enterprises must maintain their activity in the area ZES for at least seven years after the completion of the investment object of the facilitations, penalty the revocation of the granted benefits and enjoyed.

The recipient undertakings must not be in a state of liquidation or winding up.

Additional constraints to be expected

The recognition of tax advantages is subject to the following limitations:

• at least 90 per cent of the company’s staff must be recruited in the territory in which the SEZ is established;
• the total tax benefit Irap is recognized to every enterprise in the limits quota of the total cost of the assets object of investment or, in the case of the tax credit to the quota of the total cost of the assets object of investment like from art.5 L. 3 August 2017 n.123.

From the customs point of view, the advantages for businesses consist in the speeding up of procedures and in the customs facilities of a suspensive nature concerning, for example, duties and VAT.

Further reflection

We must point out that nothing concrete has yet been done to make this law operational in Italy and then as usual we are knotted on convoluted and difficult rules!

BUT WHAT DOES IT TAKE TO WRITE LIKE THE OTHERS : FOR TEN YEARS YOU PAY REDUCED TAXES IF YOU INVEST IN THESE AREAS AND IF YOU BRING TECHNOLOGICAL AND INDUSTRIAL INVESTMENTS (WHY THE TAX CREDIT)? Why do we always have to create the jungle of interpretations and knots? We saw Rotterdam (Holland) and Tanger… But what does it take?

WE ALSO USE THE WORD EXEMPTION LIMITED IN TIME AS OTHERS DO! CLARITY, SIMPLICITY, CONCRETE AND PRACTICAL APPROACH!!!

Think Tanger in the middle of the desert what she managed to do; but imagine in ITALY THAT INDUCED OUTSIDE THERE WOULD BE AROUND THE ZE!!!

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MASSIMILIANO SAMMARCO TAX HAVENS - These days there is a lot of talk about blocking and freezing the assets of the great Russian "entrepreneurs"! There is a problem, however, some Western European countries and not, have legal tax structures that for decades have allowed the possibility of hiding huge assets through sophisticated systems of anonymity, bearer bonds, trusts and tax havens. How to solve this problem to make sanctions more effective?

Dutch tax system

To better understand what we are talking about we see, for example, the Dutch tax system (which you can also read Ireland, Luxembourg, Malta, then Switzerland and the United Kingdom):

a) it has a system whereby the state can directly deal with the taxation of large groups that decide to settle on Dutch territory (for this reason there are many multinationals, the list of which is very long);

b) the BV is a holding company which, according to internal rules, is not taxed on the dividends and capital gains it receives from its worldwide resident subsidiaries;

c) in the years 80,90 and part of 2000 the Netherlands Antilles were the arrival terminal of all funds, dividends, capital gains, profits that came from the BV;

In other words, the BV was formed, the shareholder of the BV was an empty box in the Netherlands Antilles, that is a company with bearer bonds that were then deposited in a trust (also in the Netherlands Antilles) with Beneficial Owner (last owner) whose identity could never be known. Thus the BV received dividends and capital gains as mentioned in point b) did not pay taxes in the Netherlands and redistributed dividends to the company in the Netherlands Antilles where in turn no taxes were paid and then the Beneficial Owner created his local safe and from there with the same tool could reinvest in other activities in the world.

d) A partire dalla metà degli anni 2000 ECOFIN ed UE hanno cominciato a stringere un po' la mano su queste operazioni ma la trattativa segreta sulla tassazione delle multinazionali e la BV (con l’esenzione sui dividendi e le plusvalenze) sono ancora lì come in Lussemburgo, Malta, Irlanda, Regno Unito e Svizzera.

The EU must help the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Ireland, Malta and also the UK and Switzerland to find Moscow’s money

The protectorates of these countries, in the various exotic archipelagos of the world, continue to work quietly with banks around the world. The trusts are there and the bearer bonds are there!
For decades, therefore, the wealth of Olanda&co has been based on being a legalized tax haven in the EU!!! Activities that, as you can see, are evasive practices provided for by specific state agreements with their protectorates and not!

Remember the Panama Papers. The investigation has put in a row operations, in some cases to the limit of the legality, put in existence from 14 international companies charged from rich customers in managing billions of dollars capitals. In most cases, the main activity was to create «offshore» and «trust» structures in tax havens such as Panama, Dubai, the Cayman Islands and in countries where confidentiality is protected from tax controls, such as Monaco and Switzerland.

The cards that the consortium has come into possession are 12 million documents, obtained by 14 financial services companies in countries such as the British Virgin Islands, Panama, Belize, Cyprus, United Arab Emirates, Singapore and Switzerland.

In some cases there would be the extremes for accusations of corruption, money laundering and tax evasion; but in most cases, according to the «BBC», the documents would demonstrate the use of secret societies to buy goods - even legally - secretly, in the UK and elsewhere.

Would be 95 thousand the offshore societies behind these purchases, to evidence a failure of the government of London in predisposing a register of the properties offshore in spite of the announcements. And here we can also read Holland, Ireland, Luxembourg, Malta and Switzerland.

A quote to itself also Switzerland that continues to be the largest "authorized" Tax Paradise in the heart of Europe!

So we are sure that under these conditions we will really be able to freeze and block all Russian funds without the full cooperation of these countries?

Forse il sequestro di una barca potrebbe solo far sorridere un “imprenditore” russo.