SPAIN Law and Practice Contributed by: Carolina del Campo, Joan Hortalà, Jaime Collado and Pablo Álvarez, Cuatrecasas
7.6 APA User Fees Spanish tax legislation does not impose any fees on APAs. 7.7 Duration of APA Cover An APA can cover four years from the moment it is signed (not initiated), plus the present year, and it can be renewed for another four years. Its effects can also be rolled back four years after signing under certain conditions. 7.8 Retroactive Effect for APAs An APA can have a retroactive effect for four years from its signing, as long as no tax audit has taken place during that period, and the conditions and cir - cumstances remain the same. This applies to unilat - eral, bilateral and multilateral APAs. 8. Penalties and Documentation 8.1 Transfer Pricing Penalties and Defences Spain has specific TP documentation penalties. Failure to provide, or providing incomplete/false, doc - umentation is a serious infringement subject to fixed fines of EUR1,000 per “data” and EUR10,000 per “set of data”, with a cap at the lower of: • 10% of the aggregate value of related party trans - actions; or • 1% of net turnover. Proportional penalties can also apply where TP cor - rections are assessed. Maintaining robust, proportion - al, contemporaneous documentation available from the end of the voluntary filing period is the primary defence. Additionally, the law provides a specific 15% propor - tional penalty for TP when the tax authority makes a valuation adjustment and the taxpayer has failed to meet documentation requirements (eg, not providing the master/local file, providing an incomplete file or one with false data, or declaring a value that contra - dicts the taxpayer’s own documentation).
In those cases – and only if there is an actual adjust - ment – the penalty is 15% of the amount arising from each adjusted related party transaction. This propor - tional TP penalty applies alongside, but for the adjust - ed portion displaces, the general infringement regime; by contrast, if no adjustment is made, the 15% pen - alty does not apply. 8.2 Transfer Pricing Documentation Spain follows a two-tier documentation model (mas - ter file and local file) aligned to BEPS Action 13, and requires a country-by-country (CbC) report (Model 231) for groups with consolidated revenue of at least EUR750 million. Documentation must be available by the end of the voluntary filing period for the relevant fiscal year. Spain also uses Model 232 for informative disclosure of specified related party transactions and transactions with noncooperative jurisdictions; AEAT publishes the official instructions and online guidance A simplified local file is available below the EUR45 mil - lion turnover threshold, with exclusions (eg, business transfers and transfers of non‑listed equity, real estate and intangibles). Model 232 thresholds include, among others, >EUR250,000 with the same related counterparty (market value) and specific categories with their own materiality and aggregation logic; the official instruc - tions provide the operative decision table. Filing is due in the month after the ten-month period following the end of the financial year. for thresholds and content. Notes on Specific Cases 9. Alignment With OECD Guidelines 9.1 Alignment and Differences Spanish TP law is expressly interpreted in harmony with OECD Guidelines and EU outputs, subject to statutory text. Overall doctrinal and procedural align - ment is close, including acceptance of unspecified methods and ranges, and an emphasis on accurate delineation and comparability.
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