On 12 September 2016, the European Commission presented the Scoreboard of its pre-assessment of all third country (non-cooperative) jurisdictions for tax purposes. The scoreboard was the first step in the new EU listing process. On the basis of the scoreboard results (for the detailed methodology - here), Member States identified the relevant third country jurisdictions to screen in greater detail against tax good governance criteria, with the screening process due to begin in early 2017.

The Code Group is being set up to manage the process. It is intended that there should be meetings in Brussels with the relevant jurisdictions (which have not been publicly identified) between March and April. This will be followed by dialogue in Q2 to explore what solutions there might be which could resolve EU concerns. Between June and September 2017, the results will be discussed in the Code Group and will be communicated to the different jurisdictions.

The listing phase to be endorsed by finance ministers is scheduled for November/December 2017. For further information, please contact Paul Hale or Enrique Clemente.