Panama

US Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) and the Common Reporting Standard (CRS)

Panama signed the Model 1 Intergovernmental Agreement (IGA) for FATCA purposes with the US Treasury in order for Panamanian Banks to subscribe to the terms of FATCA. For this purpose, Law 51 of 2016 and Executive Decree 124 of 2017 were created to complement the IGA and establish the procedures and deadlines for the financial institutions required to perform the due diligence and send the reports to the Tax Authority.

In 2016, Panama committed to automatically exchange information starting in 2018, according to the CRS. Same as the IGA-FATCA, the CRS also includes the automatic information exchange of financial information for tax purposes, based on the agreements signed by the Tax Authority (DGI) and the CAAs.