ITALY Law and Practice Contributed by: Alessandro Pistochini, Luca Moglia, Giovanni Bellissimo and Giulia Barattini, Pistochini Avvocati Studio Legale
tive Decree 231/2001, companies themselves may be held liable if the offence benefits them, facing heavy financial penalties and interdictive measures, such as suspension of activity or bans on public contracts. 3.5 Tax Fraud Tax offences are governed by Legislative Decree No 74/2000, which sets out the following offences: fraud - ulent tax return through the use of invoices or other documents for non-existent transactions (Article 2); fraudulent tax return through other artifices (Article 3); inaccurate tax return (Article 4); failure to file a tax return (Article 5); issuing invoices or other documents for non-existent transactions (Article 8); concealment or destruction of accounting records (Article 10); fail - ure to pay certified withholding taxes (Article 10-bis); failure to pay VAT (Article 10-ter); unlawful set-off (Article 10-quater); and fraudulent evasion of tax pay - ments (Article 11). Among these offences, the most significant and fre - quently applied are: • fraudulent tax return through the use of invoices or other documents for non-existent transactions (Article 2), consisting of making use of invoices or other documents for non-existent transactions in order to evade income or value-added taxes; the applicable penalty is imprisonment for four to eight years; • failure to file a tax return (Article 5), consisting of failing to submit a tax return to which the taxpayer is legally obliged, when the amount of tax evaded exceeds fifty thousand euros for any single tax; the applicable penalty is imprisonment for two to five years; • issuing invoices or other documents for non-exist - ent transactions (Article 8), consisting of issuing or delivering invoices or other documents for non- existent transactions with the intent to allow third parties to evade income or value-added taxes; the applicable penalty is imprisonment for four to eight years; and • failure to pay VAT (Article 10-ter), consisting of fail - ing to pay, by 31 December of the year following the submission of the annual return, the value-add- ed tax due under the return, in an amount exceed - ing two hundred and fifty thousand euros for each
tax period; the applicable penalty is imprisonment for a term of six months to two years. It should be noted that the criminal offences set forth in Legislative Decree No 74/2000 will be fully repealed as of 1 January 2026 (see Article 101, paragraph 1, letter z, Legislative Decree No 173/2024). In the Italian legal system, many provisions impose reporting obligations in the tax field (eg, the duty to file income tax returns, the obligation for financial intermediaries to report suspicious transactions, etc). From a criminal law perspective, the obligation for companies to prevent tax evasion is set out in Legis - lative Decree No 231/2001, as companies are required to prevent the commission of tax offences following the 2020 inclusion of several such offences among The main criminal offence related to corporate accounting is “false corporate reporting”/”false accounting” (Article 2621 of the Civil Code). This offence punishes the conduct of directors, gener - al managers, statutory auditors, and liquidators who, with the aim of obtaining an undue profit for them - selves or others, • knowingly report in financial statements (or other corporate communications directed to sharehold - ers or the public) untrue material facts; or • omit material facts whose disclosure is required by law regarding the economic, asset, or financial situation of the company or the group to which it belongs, in a way that is concretely likely to mis - lead others. The applicable penalty is imprisonment from one to five years. Article 2622 of the Civil Code provides for a similar offence, but specifically concerns false accounting committed within listed companies, for which a higher penalty is provided: imprisonment from three to eight years. those giving rise to corporate liability. 3.6 Financial Record-Keeping
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