On 30 March 2011, the Central Tax Board gave a preliminary ruling (KVL 21/2011) stating that dividends paid from Finland to a Norwegian investment fund were not subject to tax at source, because the corresponding income is tax exempt for Finnish investment funds.

The most significant changes in the Finnish tax system in the past ten years became effective on 1 January 2005.

The Council Directive 2005/19/EC of 17 February 2005 amended the Directive 90/434/EEC 1990 (the "Merger Directive") on the common system of taxation applicable to mergers, divisions, transfers of assets and exchanges of shares concerning companies of different Member States.

The European Court of Justice (the "ECJ") handed out four closely linked judgments on 9 November 2004 concerning the exploitation of horse racing data and fixtures list data in betting coupons.

Until recently Finnish-sponsored private equity and venture capital funds were extremely simple both in terms of structures and in terms of the depth of legal documentation.

Finland is preparing a tax reform to improve flow-through taxation of investments into Finnish regulated funds, expected to be applied as of tax year 2027.

The crisis caused by the coronavirus has brought about swift changes to financial regulation.

In its new Market newsletter 2/2023, the Finnish Financial Supervisory Authority (FIN-FSA) addresses the way issuers communicate with analysts and proposes good practices.

The EU directive concerning alternative investment fund managers known as the AIFM Directive came into effect in the EU and Finland on 22 July 2013. Based on the Directive, the only type of fund management not covered is, in practice, the type that involves UCITS funds.

Sanctions, negative effective measures, which has been set to Russia are to be updated, expanded as well as practices are to become more precise.

Our tax experts Sari Laaksonen, Mikko Alakare and Anette Laitinen authored the Finland Chapter.

Pursuant to a recent ruling of the Finnish Supreme Administrative Court the terms of intra-group financing are required to be at arm's-length from the perspective of the specific Finnish borrower and higher interest charges cannot be justified by overall group level benefits.

On 26 February 2010, the Finnish Supreme Administrative Court issued and published an advance ruling (KHO:2010:12) concerning interpretation of private equity activities of a holding company and the right of the holding company in question to deduct possible liquidation losses incurred in connection with a liquidation of operative subsidiary companies.

In Finland, the first half of the year 2008 was relatively active within the M&A field.

An extensive general bankruptcy legislation reform will be implemented in Finland, which will repeal the established Bankruptcy of Act 1868. The new Bankruptcy Act (hereafter BA of 2004) will come into force on 1 September 2004. Also several additional laws will be altered due to the BA of 2004.

The Commission has imposed a total fine of EUR 676 million on 9 groups - ENI, ExxonMobil, Hansen & Rosenthal, Tudapetrol, MOL, Repsol, Sasol, RWE and Total - for participating in a paraffin wax cartel in the EEA between 1992 and 2005 in violation of Article 81 of the EC Treaty.