The first ever EU list of non-cooperative tax jurisdictions was agreed by Member States on 5 December 2017.

This list is part of the EU's work to fight tax evasion and avoidance and aims to create a stronger deterrent for countries that consistently refuse to play fair on tax matters.



Press Release / Q&A sheet (situation on 18 February 2020)

Factsheet (situation on 5 December 2017)

Evolution of the EU List

Fact-sheet, showing the evolution of the list

18 February 2020 The Council completely delisted Armenia, Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas, Bermuda, Belize, British Virgin Islands, Cabo Verde, Cook Islands, Marshall Islands, Montenegro, St Kitts and Nevis, Vietnam. Cayman Islands, Palau and Seychelles were moved from the grey list to the black list. Panama was added to the black list.

8 November 2019 The Council found North Macedonia compliants with all its commitments and removed it from the EU list completely. Belize moved from the black list to the grey list.

10 October 2019 The Council found United Arab Emirates, Albania, Costa Rica, Serbia, Switzerland and Mauritus compliant with all its commitments and removed them from the EU list completely. Marshall Islands moved from the black list to the grey list.

14 June 2019 The Council found Dominica compliant with all its commitments and removed it from the EU list completely.

17 May 2019 The Council found Aruba compliant with all its commitments and removed it from the EU list completely. Bermuda and Barbados were removed from the EU list and added to Annex I, the list of jurisdictions which have committed to improvements on a number of criteria.

12 March 2019 The Council added ten jurisdictions to the list.

4 December 2018 The Council found Andorra and San Marino compliant with all its commitments.

6 November 2018 The Council removed Namibia from the black list.

02 October 2018 The Council removed Palau from the black list and found Liechtenstein and Peru compliant with all its commitments.

25 May 2018 The Council removed the Bahamas, Saint Kitts and Nevis from the black list.

13 March 2018 The Council removed Bahrain, the Marshall Islands and Saint Lucia from the list and added the Bahamas, Saint Kitts and Nevis and the US Virgin Islands.

23 January 2018 Eight jurisdictions were removed from the list, following commitments made at a high political level to remedy EU concerns. Show all timeline

Objectives of the EU List

The overall goal of the EU list is to improve tax good governance globally, and to ensure that the EU's international partners respect the same standards as EU Member States do.

/taxation_customs/file/taxud-list-objectives-800-enpng_entaxud-list-objectives-800-en.png

The listing process

The list is a result of a thorough screening and dialogue process with non-EU countries, to assess them against agreed criteria for good governance.

These criteria relate to tax transparency, fair taxation, the implementation of OECD BEPS measures and substance requirements for zero-tax countries.

The criteria were agreed by Member States at the November 2016 ECOFIN and used as the basis for a screening "scoreboard".

/taxation_customs/file/taxud-list-process-enjpg_entaxud-list-process-en.jpg

The EU-List

The countries in the list below are those that refused to engage with the EU or to address tax good governance shortcomings (situation on 7 November of 2019).

American Samoa

Cayman Islands

Fiji

Guam

Oman

Palau

Panama

Samoa

Seychelles

Trinidad and Tobago

US Virgin Islands

Vanuatu

The EU listing process also had a very positive impact as most jurisdictions engaged constructively with the EU during the listing process.

Many made concrete, high level commitments to improve their standards, as a result of the EU screening exercise.

This is the major achievement of the EU list process.

/taxation_customs/file/taxud-list-improvements-enjpg_entaxud-list-improvements-en.jpg

*this diagramme refers to commitments made at the moment of publication of the first list .

EU Member States will continue to monitor the situation, to ensure that jurisdictions implement their commitments.

Listed jurisdictions will be removed from the list once they have addressed EU concerns.

Related links

Detailed explanation of the methodology and the scoreboard

External Strategy for Effective Taxation

EU anti-tax avoidance requirements on financing and investment operations