Singapore Activated 61 Relationships for Automatic Exchange of Financial Account Information in 2018

1          Singapore has activated 61 Automatic Exchange of Financial Account Information (“AEOI”) relationships for exchange in 2018. This reaffirms Singapore’s commitment to the international standards on transparency and tax cooperation. 

2          The 61 relationships are established under bilateral Competent Authority Agreements for the Common Reporting Standard, or the Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement on Automatic Exchange of Financial Account Information under the Common Reporting Standard which Singapore is a signatory to. Please refer to Annex A for the list of the 61 jurisdictions. 

3          More details on the 61 relationships can be found on OECD’s Automatic Exchange Portal^[1].

4          The Common Reporting Standard (“CRS”) is an internationally agreed standard endorsed by the OECD and the Global Forum on Transparency and Exchange of Information for Tax Purposes (“GF”). The Standard seeks to enhance cross-border tax transparency and deter tax evasion by taxpayers through the use of offshore bank accounts. Singapore endorsed the Standard in 2014.

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Issued by Ministry of Finance 
Singapore
15 Jan 2018

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^[1] https://www.oecd.org/tax/automatic-exchange/international-framework-for-the-crs/exchange-relationships/#d.en.345426

Explanatory Notes

Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement (“MCAA”)

The MCAA is a multilateral framework agreement that provides a standardised and efficient mechanism to facilitate the automatic exchange of information. It avoids the need for several bilateral agreements to be concluded. Its design as a framework agreement means the MCAA always ensures each signatory has ultimate control over exactly which exchange relationships it enters into and that each signatory’s standards on confidentiality, data protection and appropriate use of information always apply.

Under the MCAA, each jurisdiction is to file a notification which includes amongst others (i) a confirmation that the jurisdiction has the appropriate confidentiality and data safeguards in place; and (ii) whether the jurisdiction will exchange on a recriprocal basis or not. 
Please see www.oecd.org/tax/automatic-exchange/international-framework-for-the-crs/ for more details. 

Automatic Exchange of Information (“AEOI”)

AEOI entails systematic and regular (such as annual) transmission of taxpayer information.

Standard for Automatic Exchange of Financial Account Information (also known as the Common Reporting Standard (“CRS”))

The CRS is an internationally agreed standard for the automatic exchange of financial account information, endorsed by OECD and the Global Forum on Transparency and Exchange of Information for Tax Purposes (“GF”). The CRS sets out the financial account information to be exchanged, the financial institutions (“FIs”) required to report, the different types of accounts and taxpayers covered, as well as the customer due diligence procedures to be followed by FIs.
 

Annex A

1.    Argentina
2.    Australia
3.    Barbados
4.    Belgium
5.    Bermuda
6.    Brazil
7.    Bulgaria
8.    Canada
9.    Cayman Islands
10.    Chile
11.    Colombia
12.    Cook Islands
13.    Croatia
14.    Curacao
15.    Cyprus
16.    Czech Republic
17.    Denmark
18.    Estonia
19.    Faroe Islands
20.    Finland
21.    France
22.    Germany
23.    Greece
24.    Guernsey
25.    Iceland
26.    India
27.    Indonesia
28.    Ireland
29.    Isle of Man
30.    Italy
31.    Japan
32.    Jersey
33.    Korea
34.    Latvia
35.    Lebanon
36.    Liechtenstein
37.    Lithuania
38.    Luxembourg
39.    Malta
40.    Mexico
41.    Montserrat
42.    Nauru
43.    Netherlands
44.    New Zealand
45.    Norway
46.    Pakistan
47.    Poland
48.    Portugal
49.    Romania
50.    Russian Federation
51.    Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
52.    San Marino
53.    Saudi Arabia
54.    Seychelles
55.    Slovak Republic
56.    Slovenia
57.    South Africa
58.    Spain
59.    Sweden
60.    United Kingdom
61.    Uruguay