Initially the ordinary period to declare the beneficial owners of the companies was due on April 30, but the authorities decided to extend the deadline to May 31.
This declaration was to be submitted during the month of April; according to resolution N°DGT-ICD-R-06-2020, however, due to the state of emergency facing the country due to the Covid-19 pandemic, these institutions agreed to extend the deadline, in order to guarantee the fulfillment of this obligation and facilitate voluntary compliance, informed the Ministry of Finance.
In Costa Rica, the Constitutional Chamber ruled in favor of the Observatorio Ciudadano de Transparencia Fiscal, an institution that filed an appeal to obtain information on how many individuals appear as owners of shares.
After the Observatory requested to the Ministry of Finance statistical information that can be obtained from the Registry of Shareholders and Beneficial Owners (RABF), the authorities refused.
Panamanian authorities announced that as of September 2020, it will begin to exchange financial information automatically with the South American country.
Negotiations between the two countries began in 2019 and at the technical meetings they agreed on the mechanisms that will be used to automatically double-track the information.
The Assembly of Panama approved in third debate the draft law that creates the private and unique system of registration of final beneficiaries of legal entities.
Chapter II of the document, on Registration of Resident Agents, stipulates that any lawyer or law firm providing professional services as a resident agent for one or more legal persons, constituted or registered in the country, must register and keep in force their registration with the Superintendency of Non-Financial Subjects, the Legislative Assembly informed.
The Central American country was excluded from Russia's list of nations that do not exchange information for tax purposes, on which it had been on since 2016.
The confirmation announcement was made by Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Riabkov during the presentation of the credentials of Panama's new ambassador to the Russian Federation, Efrain Villarreal, reported the Panamanian Foreign Ministry.
In Costa Rica, the Legislative Assembly approved in first debate a bill to avoid fines for errors in the declaration of the shareholders' registry for two months.
In its first debate, the file 21,758 Law of Moratorium for the Application of Sanctions corresponding to the ordinary declaration of the 2019 period, related to the transparency and final beneficiaries’ registry, provided for in the Law to Improve the Fight against Tax Fraud, was approved. The initiative gives an extension for shareholders of corporations to submit their lists, before applying sanctions, reported the Legislative Assembly.
In El Salvador, there is a demand that the updating of the Law on Public Administration Procurement and Contracting that the deputies seek to make be carried out without neglecting the principles of competition and transparency.
After the Executive submitted the amendments to the draft reform of the Public Administration Procurement and Contracting Law (LACAP) to the Legislative in 2019, a sub-committee of the Assembly is examining the proposals.
The French government reported that it removed Guatemala from the list of countries that do not cooperate with the exchange of fiscal information, but kept Panama.
The European country's authorities reported that Guatemala was removed from the list because it ratified the convention on mutual administrative assistance in tax matters of the Council of Europe and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
Costa Rican businessmen support efforts to avoid changes to the bill being discussed in the Legislative Assembly, which originally seeks to stop abuses in hiring directly by public entities.
Businessmen ask for an immediate extension in the application of any fines, as many representatives of companies have not yet managed their digital signature and at this time, there is no capacity installed in the authorized posts.
Twelve years after having settled in Guatemala and after multiple struggles for the non-renewal of its mandate, from today the International Commission against Impunity is no longer operating.
In August 2007, the Congress of the Republic approved the creation of the International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG), which arrived in the country with the mission of investigating criminal structures operating within government institutions, work done in association with the Public Prosecutor's Office.
As of September 1, approximately 370,000 legal entities will be required to comply with the Registry of Transparency and Final Beneficiaries, with the legal documents ending in 0 and 1 being the ones that must do so first.
However, as of September 1, 2019, legal entities who prefer it, regardless of the last digit of their identity card, may make their declaration and send it in advance.
After the Salvadoran president announced the possible installation of an International Commission against Corruption and Impunity, the business sector asked to "evaluate the experiences of Guatemala and Honduras.”
After Bukele reported that before his 100 days in office he would present a proposal to install an international commission in the country, the National Association of Private Enterprise (ANEP) said it is essential to comply with the law and that there must be real political will to fight corruption.
During its last visit to Guatemala, the IMF warned that if banking secrecy is not lifted in the country, compliance with "international transparency treaties" could be undermined.
After the last visit of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to Guatemala, the international organization warned that reversing the decrease in tax collection involves strengthening the control of large taxpayers, improving the use of tax information to reduce non-compliance, reallocating resources to risk-based audits, and reconsidering the lifting of bank secrecy for tax auditing purposes.
Because of doubts that have arisen in the business sector, in Costa Rica it was reported that the start of shareholder registration was postponed six months and will enter into force on September 1 of this year.
The aim of this process is to facilitate compliance with the obligation that companies must inform the Treasury on the composition of its share capital, as well as the identification of final beneficiaries, under the provisions of the Law to Improve the Fight against Tax Fraud, a statement from the Central Bank of Costa Rica (BCCR).
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