Over 1000 Automatically Exchanging Information

Written by William Byrnes | Posted in International • OECD

As a further step to implement the OECD Common Reporting Standard (CRS), the first series of bilateral automatic exchange relationships were established among the first batch of jurisdictions committed to exchanging information automatically as of 2017.

With still a year to go before the first exchanges of information on financial accounts pursuant to the OECD Common Reporting Standard (CRS), there are now more than 1 000 bilateral relationships in place across the globe, most of them based on the Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement on Automatic Exchange of Financial Account Information (the CRS MCAA). The full list of automatic exchange relationships that are now in place under the CRS MCAA and other legal instruments can be accessed here.

More jurisdictions will nominate the partners with which they will undertake automatic exchanges in the coming months. The next update on the latest bilateral exchange relationships will be published before the end of 2016, with updates to follow on a periodic basis. In total, 101 jurisdictions have agreed to start automatically exchanging financial account information in September 2017 and 2018, under the CRS.

This wave of activations of bilateral exchange relationships is an important step towards the timely implementation of the OECD-developed international standard for the automatic exchange of financial account information, the CRS, and reflects the determination of jurisdictions around the world to deliver on their political commitment to fight tax evasion.This section shows all bilateral exchange relationships that are currently in place for the automatic exchange of CRS information. The relationships shown included those under the framework of Article 6 of the Multilateral Convention and the CRS MCAA, as well as exchange relationships based on bilateral agreements and the EU framework.

As of October 2016, and with still almost a year to go until the first exchange date on 30 September 2017, there are now already over 1000 bilateral exchange relationships activated with respect to jurisdictions committed to a 2017 timeline.

Activated exchange relationships can be sorted and displayed from both the perspective of a particular sending jurisdiction (“FROM”) or a particular receiving jurisdiction (“TO”). For each exchange relationship, the legal basis and, where appropriate, the effective date and/or the activation date are shown. The number in brackets behind each jurisdiction in the drop-down menu indicates the total number of bilateral exchange relationships that are currently activated with respect to that jurisdiction.

William Byrnes

William H. Byrnes has achieved authoritative prominence with more than 20 books, treatise chapters and book supplements, 1,000 media articles, and the monthly subscriber Tax Facts Intelligence. Titles include: Lexis® Guide to FATCA Compliance, Foreign Tax and Trade Briefs, Practical Guide to U.S. Transfer Pricing, and Money Laundering, Asset Forfeiture; Recovery, and Compliance (a Global Guide). He is a principal author of the Tax Facts series. He was a Senior Manager, then Associate Director of international tax for Coopers and Lybrand, and practiced in Southern Africa, Western Europe, South East Asia, the Indian sub-continent, and the Caribbean. He has been commissioned by a number of governments on tax policy. Obtained the title of tenured law professor in 2005 at St. Thomas in Miami, and in 2008 the level of Associate Dean at Thomas Jefferson. William Byrnes pioneered online legal education in 1995, thereafter creating the first online LL.M. offered by an ABA accredited law school (International Taxation and Financial Services graduate program).