On 3 August 2021, the OECD published several updates with respect to the transfer pricing country profiles. Next to certain profiles being updated, some new country profiles were added. In total, 20 country profiles were updated of which 3 new countries were added, bringing the total number of countries covered to 60. These country profiles include the current state of the countries’ domestic legislation regarding key transfer pricing principles as well as an indication to what extent these rules follow the OECD Transfer Pricing Guidelines. The updates include two new sections, now also covering the transfer pricing treatment of financial transactions and the application of the Authorised OECD Approach (AOA) to attribute profits to permanent establishments. Furthermore, the OECD indicated that updates to the transfer pricing country profiles will be conducted in batches throughout the second half of 2021 and the first half of 2022.
The transfer pricing country profiles include information on the countries’ legislation, such as on the arm's length principle, the transfer pricing methods, comparability analysis, intangibles, intra-group services, cost contribution agreements, transfer pricing documentation, administrative approaches to avoiding and resolving disputes, safe harbours and other implementation measures. The 2 new sections (financial transactions and AOA) were now added to the updated country profiles.
In this batch, the country profiles of the following countries were updated or added:
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Angola (new) |
New Zealand |
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Argentina |
Nigeria |
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Australia |
Norway |
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Colombia |
Romania (new) |
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Costa Rica |
Russian Federation |
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Czech Rep. |
Slovak Rep. |
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Denmark |
Spain |
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India |
Switzerland |
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Japan |
Tunisia (new) |
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Netherlands |
Turkey |
The OECD has been publishing transfer pricing country profiles since 2009. In 2017, the country profiles were significantly modified to reflect the changes in the transfer pricing framework of jurisdictions as a result of the 2015 OECD/G20 Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) Project reports on Actions 8-10 and on Action 13. The country profiles were also expanded to cover non-OECD member jurisdictions.
The transfer pricing country profiles can be found on the website of the OECD: https://www.oecd.org/tax/transfer-pricing/transfer-pricing-country-profiles.htm.
If you have questions or would like to obtain more information on this topic, do not hesitate to contact the authors:
Stefanie Van heugten (stefanie.vanheugten@tiberghien.com)
Ben Plessers (ben.plessers@tiberghien.com)