CELEX: E2004J0001
Language: en
Date: 2004-11-23 00:00:00
Title: Judgment of the Court of  23 November 2004  in Case E-1/04 Fokus Bank ASA and The Norwegian State, represented by Skattedirektoratet (the Directorate of Taxes)  (Free movement of capital — taxation of dividends — tax credit granted exclusively to shareholders resident in a Contracting Party — denial of procedural rights to shareholders resident in other Contracting Parties)

23.2.2006   
            
            
               EN
            
            
               Official Journal of the European Union
            
            
               C 45/10
            
         
      JUDGMENT OF THE COURT
   
   of 23 November 2004
   in Case E-1/04 Fokus Bank ASA and The Norwegian State, represented by Skattedirektoratet (the Directorate of Taxes)
   
      (Free movement of capital — taxation of dividends — tax credit granted exclusively to shareholders resident in a Contracting Party — denial of procedural rights to shareholders resident in other Contracting Parties)
   
   (2006/C 45/06)
   In Case E-1/04 between Fokus Bank ASA and the Norwegian State, represented by Skattedirektoratet, — REQUEST to the Court by Frostating lagmannsrett (Frostating Court of Appeal) on the interpretation of the rules of free movement of capital within the EEA, the Court, composed of Carl Baudenbacher, President and Judge-Rapporteur, Per Tresselt and Thorgeir Örlygsson, Judges, gave judgment on 23 November 2004, the operative part of which is as follows:
   
               1.
            
            
               Article 40 EEA precludes legislation whereby shareholders resident in a specific Contracting Party are granted a tax credit on dividends paid by a company resident in that Contracting Party, whereas non-resident shareholders are not granted such a tax credit. Whether the taxpayer is resident in another Contracting Party which, in a tax agreement with the Contracting Party wherein the dividend is distributed, has undertaken to grant credit for withholding tax, or whether the taxpayer in the specific case actually is granted, or will be granted, credit for the withholding tax, is of no legal significance.
            
         
               2.
            
            
               In a situation such as the one at issue in the main proceedings, it is not consistent with the EEA Agreement that a Contracting Party deals solely with the distributing company when assessing and reassessing the withholding tax without notifying the non-resident shareholders.