On the occasion of the Tax Certainty Day 2021, held on 22nd November, the OECD released the 2020 Mutual Agreement Procedure Statistics and the winners of the 2020 MAP awards in five categories: Category 1 - Average time to close MAP cases, Category 2 - Age of Inventory, Category 3 - Caseload Management, Category 4 - Co-operation and Category 5 - Most Improved Jurisdiction.
Spain was the winner of the award in Category 2 “age of the inventory” and co-winner with Italy of the award in Category 4 “cooperation”.
Award 3, Category 2 “age of inventory”
- Methodology: Smallest portion of cases received before 1 January 2016 (or 1 January of the year of joining the BEPS Inclusive Framework) in end inventory, in %
- Type of cases: Both transfer pricing cases and other cases
- Size: Jurisdictions with more than 100 cases left in 2020 end inventory
- Winner: Spain with approximately 5.6%.
Award 6, Transfer pricing cases, Category 4 “Co-operation”
- Methodology: Most number of MAP cases fully resolved through agreement by a pair of jurisdictions as compared to their total MAP caseload as determined by the agreement score***
- Type of cases: Transfer pricing cases received after 1 January 2016 (or 1 January of the year of joining the BEPS Inclusive Framework)
- Size: Pairs of jurisdictions with more than 20 transfer pricing cases pending in 2020 (start inventory + cases started)
- Winners: Italy and Spain with an agreement score of approximately 60 points.
In addition, Spain belongs to the top-five countries with the shortest average time to close MAP cases related to transfer pricing (Category 1) with more than 50 cases closed in 28 months, only after Switzerland, Canadá and the Netherlands.
Spain has improved its position in the three categories from the previous year, where it got a second place in the age of inventory with a 11% of pre-2016 cases in end inventory, also a second place together with Italy in cooperation with an agreement score of approximately 56 points and was placed in the tenth position of countries with the shortest average time to close MAP cases related to transfer pricing (33 months).
Futher information on the OECD´s website:
https://www.oecd.org/tax/administration/oecd-tax-certainty-day.htm