Freshfields

This Practice Note explains the various reliefs from corporation tax available (provided certain requirements are met) upon incorporation of an overseas branch, including relief in respect of chargeable gains and under the intangible fixed assets regime, as well as relief pursuant to the UK legislation that implemented the Mergers Tax Directive.

This Practice Note outlines how a UK tax resident company can migrate from the UK in practice, including by way of direct emigration (by transferring its tax residence overseas) or corporate inversion (by inserting a new non-UK resident top company). This Practice Note also briefly explains how and why a non-UK company might migrate to the UK by becoming UK tax resident. Produced in partnership with Nicholas Gardener of Ashurst.

This Practice Note outlines the UK corporation tax exit charges that can arise as a result of a company’s migration by shifting its tax residence from the UK to another jurisdiction; the circumstances in which such charges can be deferred; and the post-migration UK tax considerations.

This Practice Note looks specifically at the two key criminal offences introduced by the Pension Schemes Act 2021 which came into force on 1 October 2021, namely ‘avoidance of employer debt’ and ‘risking accrued scheme benefits’, including who they apply to, what types of activity will be caught, when they can be prosecuted, and what constitutes a reasonable excuse, as well as their impact on the sponsoring employers and trustees of defined benefit pension schemes.

This Practice Note sets out the obligations of cryptoasset service providers (CASPs) under the EU’s Recast Wire Transfer Regulation 2 (Recast EU WTR2) (also referred to as the Recast Funds Transfer Regulation 2 (Recast FTR2)) and the European Banking Authority’s (EBA) Travel Rule Guidelines, applicable from 30 December 2024. It provides practical guidance on tackling key challenges for CASPs such as self-hosted addresses and a lack of standardised messaging infrastructure.

This Practice Note provides guidance on the UK protection of databases and database rights. It examines what a database is, copyright in databases and the sui generis database right. The Practice Note also covers competition issues that may arise from the exercising of rights that protect databases and deals with other ways of protecting databases such as using the law of confidential information, database application software, and provides practical tips for protecting databases.

This Practice Note considers the application of the Financial Conduct Authority’s (FCA) Consumer Duty to wholesale firms. It considers the scoping exercise for wholesale firms, including relevant exclusions, the meaning of material influence, and the proportional application of the Consumer Duty. For those activities of a wholesale firm which fall within the scope of the Consumer Duty, it sets out a number of key considerations in respect of each cross-cutting obligation and each of the four retail customer outcomes. Furthermore, it considers how the requirements of the Consumer Duty overlap with pre-existing regulatory rules applicable to the wholesale sector, in particular, the FCA’s Product Intervention and Product Governance Sourcebook (PROD) and UK retail disclosure requirements.

This Precedent is a letter notifying HMRC (as required by TMA 1970, s 109B) of a company’s intention to cease to be UK resident and seeking HMRC’s approval of the proposed arrangements for payment of the company’s UK tax liabilities.