The eighteenth final provision of the Project of Law of General State Budget for the year 2019 establishes, with effects for the tax periods that begin as of January 1, 2019 and that have not concluded upon the entry into force of the Law, the modification of the Law 11/2009, of October 26, which regulates the SOCIMIS, introducing a special tax of 15% on the non-distributed profits. Such special tax will be accrued on the day of the agreement for the application of the result of the year by the general meeting of shareholders, or equivalent body, and must be paid within two months from the date of accrual.

According to the introduction of the Project of Law, the amendment aims to "provide greater liquidity and facilitate the recovery of the investments made by the shareholders of the SOCIMIS". Bearing in mind the above, it seems clear that the general obligations of distribution of benefits foreseen for the SOCIMIS (80% in general and 50% of the benefit obtained in the transfer of properties and shares of other SOCIMIS) are maintained and that the special tax will be applied on the benefits which distribution is optional (20% in general and 50% of the benefit obtained in the transfer of properties and shares of other SOCIMIS), which would be the only benefits that would increase the liquidity of the shareholder compared to the distribution obligations foreseen in the regulations currently in force.

However, the planned reform does not clarify what happens with the benefits attributable to exercises in which the company was not under the special fiscal regime of SOCIMIS. In principle, given that said benefits are not subject to the distribution obligation (article 6.1.b of Law 11/2009) and that are taxed under the general regime of Corporate Tax (article 12.1.c of Law 11/2009), it does not seem that such benefits are subject to the special tax, but it would be desirable that this point is clarified in the parliamentary procedure.

In addition, certain technical adjustments are made to the tax regime of the SOCIMIS, in order to adapt the said regime to the new special tax.

In this extent, the special tax of 19% foreseen in article 9.2 of Law 11/2009 in relation to dividends distributed to shareholders that do not have the status of SOCIMI and that are subject to tax at a rate lower than 10%, is reduced to 4.75% when the dividends come from reserves that have been subject to the aforementioned special tax of 15%.

Secondly, the dividends and capital gains from SOCIMIS obtained by taxpayers of Corporate Tax (which do not have the status of SOCIMIS) and by Spanish permanent establishments of non-Spanish residents the Income Tax of Non-Residents will be entitled, with limitations, to the application of the participation exemption foreseen in article 21 of Law 27/2014, of November 27, of the Corporate Tax, provided that the rest of the requirements are met (stake of at least 5 % and holding period greater than one year). Thus, in case of distribution of dividends, when the dividends distributed come from reserves to which the special tax of 15% has been applied, the participation exemption will apply to half of the dividend distributed with charge to said reserves. In the case of capital gains derived from the transfer of shares of the SOCIMI, the participation exemption will apply to 50% of the capital gain corresponding to reserves generated during the holding period that have been subject to the special tax of 15%.

Finally, the information to be included in the accounting memory is modified in the sense of identifying the reserves that have been subject to the 15% special tax and the dividends that come from them (to facilitate the shareholders to fulfil their tax obligations).