Closing the loopholes in the EU Savings Directive

Slowly and one by one, the EU Commission is perhaps going to tackle the loopholes of the Savings Directive. At least to try to make this instrument more effective. In a recent a speech, EU tax commissioner, Laszlo Kovacs, said that the European Commission plans to work with financial centres outside of the EU, such Hong Kong and Singapore, to encourage them to adopt measures contained in the Savings Directive. That extension would already curb one clear example where the Directive failed.

But what about other issues like for example the controversy about the definition on beneficial owner, and what is covered and what is not?. As pointed out by several practitioners, for example trustees are not dealt with by the E.U. Directive. In fact, it is not clear why such an important instrument is not considered giving the magnitude of investment income collected and distributed by trusts.