The globalisation of economies and the increase in cross-border operations have posed a major challenge for tax authorities. The last few years have been key in terms of increasing the transparency of international information and consolidating all information exchanges promoted in the European Union and within the OECD .

As a result of consensus in the international community and a determined political will, several initiatives have been launched in the field of international exchange of tax information, which are already resulting in tax authorities having access to a large amount of cross-border data. In this way, the international exchange of tax information has been consolidated as a fundamental tool for the effective application of tax systems.

Indeed, over the last decade we have witnessed the modification of several international Conventions and Agreements, as well as the adoption of other new instruments, which have allowed the international exchange of information to become increasingly broader in terms of the countries and jurisdictions included and in terms of the categories and nature of the information exchanged. Likewise, the promotion of automatic exchanges of information has been of great relevance in this evolution.

Firstly, it is worth mentioning the rapid expansion of international tax exchange relations under the Convention on Mutual Administrative Assistance in Tax Matters of the OECD and the Council of Europe (MAC) as amended by the 2010 Protocol, which entered into force on 1 June 2011. The great advantage of this Convention is its multilateral approach, which has allowed for the establishment of cooperation and information exchange relations between the 144 territories that have signed it to date, without the need to sign bilateral instruments that provide for the exchange of information. Furthermore, the Convention provides for broader forms of tax cooperation and a more extensive exchange of information, ensuring the uniform application of the international standard of exchange of information with the aim of combating tax avoidance and evasion.

Within the European Union, in addition to the exchange of information collected within the scope of the VAT, established in Regulation 904/2010, it is worth mentioning the consolidation of automatic exchanges between Member States, which allow Spain to receive information on different categories of income obtained abroad by taxpayers resident in Spain. Thus, the Tax Agency has been receiving automatically, by virtue of Council Directive 2011/16/EU, of February 15, 2011, relating to administrative cooperation in the field of direct taxation (known as DAC1) information on pensions, income from dependent employment, director's fees and property ownership and real estate income obtained in the Member States. In addition, it should be noted that the Tax Agency had already been receiving information on income and assets held in those countries with which Spain had signed agreements to avoid double taxation in which the automatic exchange of income was provided for.

Spain signed the Protocol of Amendment to the MAC on 11 March 2011, which came into force on 1 January 2013, thereby establishing the broadest exchange relations with all the signatory territories of the Convention. Under this, as well as the network of bilateral treaties and EU cooperation directives, the AEAT has been receiving an increasing volume of information with fiscal relevance in relation to assets, rights and income that are located or have been obtained abroad.

Subsequently, a new information exchange standard was established, the automatic exchange of financial accounts, better known as the Common Reporting Standard or by its acronym in English, Common Reporting Estándar (CRS ), whose immediate antecedent was the Agreement between the Kingdom of Spain and the United States of America for the improvement of international tax compliance with the implementation of the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act - FATCA (Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act). Under the latter, Spain carried out the first automatic exchange of financial accounts in September 2015 with the United States (FATCA).

For the implementation of the CRS, Spain signed the Multilateral Agreement between Competent Authorities on the automatic exchange of financial account information , in Berlin on October 29, 2014 (CRS). At the level of the European Union, Council Directive 2014/107/EU of December 9, 2014 (known as DAC 2) was approved to incorporate the automatic exchange standard to the EU Cooperation Directive.

It should be noted that Spain was a pioneer in the automatic exchange of financial accounts (CRS) developed by the OECD and promoted by the Global Forum on Transparency and Exchange of Information (of which 164 jurisdictions are currently members). Thus, at the end of September 2017, Spain participated in the automatic exchange of financial accounts with the 49 jurisdictions initially committed. In September 2018, there were already 100 participants in this exchange and, in the latest exchange that took place during September 2021, 108 countries and jurisdictions committed to exchanging information on financial accounts.

It is also worth noting that the list of countries and jurisdictions participating in the aforementioned CRS Multilateral Agreement, and which therefore exchange information on financial accounts with other countries, includes the main international financial centres. This is an example of the great change that has taken place in the panorama of international tax exchange. Jurisdictions where banking secrecy was a reality years ago are now exchanging financial accounts with the countries of residence of their holders and automatically, that is, without the need for a prior investigation in the country of residence.

Under these legal instruments, the Tax Agency receives financial information regarding the ownership, balances, dividends, interest, amortizations and other capital income obtained in any of the 107 countries and foreign jurisdictions by taxpayers resident in Spanish territory. All this flow of international information that the Tax Agency receives annually is incorporated into the databases and, together with the rest of the national information, allows the verification of the correct fulfillment of the obligations of the taxpayers, guaranteeing the effective application of our tax system.

In short, the consolidation of the exchange of financial account information together with the broader exchange taking place within the European Union allows for significant progress to be made both in the efforts to prevent future non-compliance, by promoting voluntary compliance, and in the fight against tax fraud.