On 17 May 2019, the European Council announced updates to the EU list of noncooperative jurisdictions for tax purposes.
Aruba, Barbados and Bermuda each have made the required changes to their laws and/or political commitments to get them removed from the main list.
Barbados has made commitments at a high political level to remedy EU concerns regarding the replacement of its harmful preferential regimes by a measure of similar effect, whilst Aruba and Bermuda now have implemented their commitments. At the same time, Bermuda remains committed to address EU concerns in the area of collective investment funds. As a consequence, Barbados and Bermuda will be moved from Annex I of the conclusions to Annex II, that includes jurisdictions that have undertaken sufficient commitments to reform their tax policies, while Aruba will be removed entirely from both annexes.
As a result, only 12 jurisdictions remain on the list: American Samoa, Belize, Dominica, Fiji, Guam, Marshall Islands, Oman, Samoa, Trinidad & Tobago, United Arab Emirates, the US Virgin Islands, and Vanuatu.
The Council has indicated that it will continue to regularly review and update the list in 2019, but has requested that updates are limited to a maximum of two per year as from 2020.
