The Commission has published a working document on savings taxation. This document deals with the Commission's work in relation to refining the present coverage of the Council Directive 2003/48/EC on taxation of income from savings.

This working paper deals only with the application of the Savings Taxation Directive inside the EU.

According to the introduction of the document, recent events have shown how important it is to establish international cooperation with a view to preventing, in the direct taxation area, fraud and evasion linked to cross-border financial investments.

The document [SEC/2008/559] outlines key issues that need to be clarified including:

• whether there is a wish to go beyond the current definition of beneficial owner for the purposes of the Savings Taxation Directive;
• whether a well defined “substance over form” principle should be enshrined in the Directive;
• whether the Savings Taxation Directive is, or is not, an appropriate legal instrument to accommo date rules on cooperation between Member States for enabling taxation of types of investment income which are substantially different from interest.