The Economy Ministry is drafting a tax amnesty bill for Argentines with money, goods, or financial assets in undeclared accounts. The project, which will be presented in Congress in the coming days, comes after Economy Minister Sergio Massa signed a FATCA (Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act) agreement with the US government that will provide the government with information about Argentines’ undeclared accounts in the North American country.

According to the deal’s fine print, the information will be shared no sooner than September 2024, a year after the deadline for declaring accounts in the government’s project.

According to a government memo seen by the Buenos Aires Herald, the amnesty reaches individuals, undivided estates and companies presenting undeclared “national and/ or foreign currency in the country and/or overseas, financial assets, real estate, movable goods, and other goods in the country and/or overseas (including credits)” before September 30th, 2023. Those who comply will not be legally prosecuted by the state in the civil, commercial, criminal tax, and customs courts, and “will not be subject to Income Tax, Value-Added Tax, Taxes over Personal Goods and special contributions for cooperatives”.

The amnesty protocol will have three stages: for those who repatriate their goods (i.e. enter a to-be-determined percentage of them into the country) the aliquot will be 2.5%; for those who make the declaration from the law’s entry into force until March 31th 2023 it will be 5%; and for those who declare between April 1st 2023 and June 30th, 2023; and, finally, 7.5% for those who declare between July 1st, 2023 up to September 30th, 2023.

Aliquots will be doubled if holders choose not to repatriate the goods. The aliquots are, however, significantly lower than the 10% fees of Mauricio Macri’s amnesty in 2017.

The bill also creates a “simplified tax code” which creates a special aliquot of 1.5% for individuals who declare national or foreign currency, whose amount is lower than 35% of their annual income and than US$ 50,000.

The project will also create the figure of a “whistleblower”, that is, if a person provides the government with information that allows the detection of undeclared goods or ploys with the goal of committing tax fraud, they will be granted a percentage of what is collected.

As is customary for tax amnesties, government officials and their relatives won’t be able to participate.