BFH Ruling on VAT-Free Business Transfers in Complex Transactions

• The sale of a business can be complicated, especially when transferring complex businesses.
• Section 1, Paragraph 1a of the German Value Added Tax Act (UStG) aims to simplify the transfer of entire businesses or independent parts of businesses.
• The German legislator has created a regulation that often leads to disputes with the tax authorities.
• The question of a transfer of ownership is particularly controversial.
• The tax authorities have argued very formally in this regard.
• The XIth Senate of the Federal Fiscal Court (BFH) has argued in an excellent way in the present decision according to the purpose of the provision in light of European VAT law.
• The decision significantly simplifies the situation for practitioners.
• Water supply systems that have been built on land owned by others can be delivered to the owner or a third party.
• If a city acquires the water supply systems from the old supplier as part of a change of water supplier and delivers them directly to the new supplier with the obligation to return them to the new supplier upon termination of the new contract…

Source: datenbank.nwb.de

Note that this post was (partially) written with the help of AI. It is always useful to review the original source material, and where needed to obtain (local) advice from a specialist.

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