Romania’s Government adopted the Emergency Ordinance no. 186/2022 approving certain measures for the application of the Council Regulation (EU) 2022/1854 on an emergency intervention to address high energy prices (the “GEO 186/2022“) that entered into force on December 29th, 2022.
GEO 186/2022 implements the recent Council Regulation (EU) 2022/1854 on an emergency intervention to address high energy prices (the “Regulation 2022/1854“) imposing the Member States obligation to introduce a temporary solidarity contribution on any profits realized in 2022 and/or 2023 which are above a 20 % increase of the average of the taxable profits in the four fiscal years starting on or after 1 January 2018. Such excess amount should be subject to at least a 33% contribution, although Member States may opt to apply a higher percentage.
Companies that are affected:
As compared to the Regulation 2022/1854, the Romania’s Government expanded the spectrum of participants by also including some of the affiliates of the companies that carry out activities in the crude petroleum, natural gas, coal and refinery sectors (irrespective if such are part of a consolidated group merely for tax purposes).
The solidarity contribution applies to:
a) Profit tax payers and microenterprise income tax payers that carry out activities in the crude petroleum, natural gas, coal and refinery sectors, provided the revenues derived from such activities are equal to or greater than 75% of their turnover.
The relevant NACE Codes[1] are: Code 0610 Extraction of crude petroleum, Code 0620 Extraction of natural gas, Code 0510 Mining of hard coal, Code 1910 Manufacture of coke oven products, Code 1920 Manufacture of refined petroleum products.
b) Profit tax payers and microenterprise income tax payers that are affiliates of the companies falling under item a) above, in case the revenues derived from the business carried out with the latter is equal to or greater than 50% of the turnover registered by such affiliate in 2022 and, respectively, 2023.
c) Profit tax payers and microenterprise income tax payers that are affiliates of the companies falling under item b) above, in case the revenues derived from the business carried out with the companies falling under item b) above is equal to or greater than 50% of the turnover registered by the affiliate in 2022 and, respectively, 2023.
Solidary contribution quota and base for calculation:
Romania’s Government opted for a higher quota for the solidarity contribution that the minimum threshold provided by the Regulation 2022/1854 – the quota set by GEO 186/2022 is 60%.
The base for calculating the solidarity contribution is the “surplus profits” of the years 2022 and 2023.
Method of payment
The new solidarity contribution will be declared and paid annually until June 25th of the following year or until the 25th of the sixth month following the end of the tax year (if such is different from the calendar year).
The template of the statement for declaring the new solidarity contribution will be approved by order issued by the President of the National Tax Administration Agency within 30 days as of the entry into force of GEO 186/2022.
The solidarity contribution will apply in addition to the already existing windfall taxes on the additional revenues obtained from the activities in natural gas sector.
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For any further details regarding the above, please contact Raluca Gabor, Managing Associate in the Energy team at RGabor@saa.ro.
[1] As per the classification contained by the Regulation (EC) No. 1893/2006 of the European Parliament and of the Council establishing the statistical classification of economic activities NACE Revision 2 and amending Council Regulation (EEC) No 3037/90 as well as certain EC Regulations on specific statistical domains.