Tax-related risks of mergers and acquisitions in Croatia: drawing the line between legitimate business restructuring and aggressive tax planning

Mergers and acquisitions of Croatian target companies may involve significant tax risks for domestic and foreign acquirers. Over the recent years, Croatian tax authorities have started to vigorously assess the economic substance of the envisaged M&As, often denying the acquirer different tax benefits, thus making the entire restructuring costlier. In doing so, Croatian tax authorities rely on a myriad of domestic anti-tax avoidance rules according to which M&A operations may be characterised as abusive. Accordingly, this paper offers a descriptive and systematic account on how Croatian anti-tax avoidance legislation may hinder M&A activity. Thereby, our aim is primarily to explore, both from a substantive and procedural point of view, the imagined boundary between legitimate and abusive tax planning. Transakcije spajanja i preuzimanja često su izvor raznovrsnih poreznih rizika. U recentnoj praksi hrvatskih poreznih tijela sve su češći slučajevi odbijanja poreznih pogodnosti za navedene transakcije, temeljem različitih protuevazijskih pravila ugrađenih u domaće zakonodavstvo. Riječju, analizom gospodarske biti planiranog restrukturiranja porezna tijela izvode zaključak kako je posrijedi (zakonito) izbjegavanje plaćanja poreza. Cilj je rada, u svjetlu važećeg protuevazijskog pravnog okvira, ocrtati granicu između dopuštenog i legitimnog poreznog planiranja s jedne strane te porezne evazije s druge. U tom smislu posebno će se upozoriti i na relevantne postupovno-pravne aspekte, poput pravila o teretu dokazivanja.