Italian taxation of inheritances and trusts

The book outlines in the first part the main aspects of italian inheritance tax legislation and, namely, its territorial scope of application, the issues concerning the taxable estate – such as the valuation of assets, the deductibility of liabilities and the available exemptions – the applicable tax rates and, finally, the essential features of the procedural aspects. The analysis is carried out making a constant reference to the principles stated by the European Court of Justice that, since 2003 with the Barbier case, has been dealing with inheritance tax provisions paying attention to their consistency with the fundamental freedoms guaranteed by the eU treaty. In the second part of the book the analysis is shifted to the “state of the art” of the italian legislation regarding the taxation of trusts, focusing first on the recognition of trusts for income tax purposes and their tax residence and, subsequently, on the tax treatment of the income derived by the trust and of the distributions to the beneficiaries. At last, the application of the inheritance and gift tax is examined.