Kazakhstan

Accounting system

Kazakhstan legal entities should maintain accounts and produce financial statements in accordance with IFRS or national accounting standards (depending on the size of the company and other factors). In most cases, tax treatment follows the accounting treatment.

United States (US) Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA)

On 11 September 2017, Kazakhstan and the United States signed an intergovernmental agreement (IGA) under Model I to improve international tax compliance with respect to the US FATCA, which will enable the automatic exchange of financial information on each country's resident taxpayers to support tax enforcement efforts.

The IGA will be in force after the parties notify each other in writing that all necessary internal procedures have been completed.

As of March 2022, the President of Kazakhstan signed the law on ratification of the IGA.

Multilateral Convention on Mutual Administrative Assistance in Tax Matters (Strasbourg Convention)

Kazakhstan is a signatory of the Strasbourg Convention (ratified in December 2014) for administrative co-operation with other states in the assessment and collection of taxes with a view to combating tax avoidance and evasion.

Kazakhstan did not join multilateral competent authority agreements on automatic exchange of information under the Strasbourg Convention.

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) project

Kazakhstan joined the Inclusive Framework on BEPS in January 2017. By joining the framework, Kazakhstan pledged to adopt and promote the implementation of the four minimum standards designed by the OECD in the BEPS project.

Multilateral Convention to Implement Tax Treaty Related Measures to Prevent BEPS (MLI)

On 25 June 2018, Kazakhstan signed the MLI. The MLI, which was developed as a result of the BEPS plan, envisages introduction of a number of supplements and amendments to existing DTTs.

Kazakhstan expressed intention to extend some of the MLI provisions to all its DTTs conducted with the MLI member states.

The MLI entered into force in Kazakhstan starting from 1 October 2020.

Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement (MCAA) on Automatic Exchange of Financial Account Information

In June 2018, Kazakhstan signed the MCAA on Automatic Exchange of Financial Account Information, which envisages implementation of the common reporting standard for the automatic exchange of financial account information (CRS).

The CRS will allow the Kazakhstan tax authorities to automatically obtain financial information, such as remaining balances of bank accounts maintained by Kazakhstan taxpayers, from other CRS member states. Kazakhstan intends to perform the first automatic exchange of information in September 2020.

On 1 December 2021, in the framework of CRS, Kazakhstan started receiving information on foreign assets and income of its residents from 69 members of the MCAA.