Out-Law News

Online portal for UAE economic substance regulation notifications to go live


The United Arab Emirates (UAE) authorities have confirmed that notifications and annual reports due under its new Economic Substance Regulations (ESRs) will have to be submitted through an online portal which will go live in the first week of December.

The UAE Ministry of Finance (MOF) also delayed the submission deadline for notifications that would have been due before the portal goes live until 31 December 2020. This impacts, for example, licensed entities with a 31 March 2020 financial year end that would have been due to make their notifications by 30 September 2020.

The MOF said licensees that had already submitted notifications will now need to re-submit the notification via the portal. Failure to submit or re-submit notifications will attract a fine of AED 20,000 (€4,600).

Companies with financial years ending on 31 December 2019, or shorter financial years ending before that date, must file their annual reports on or before 31 December. The failure to submit annual reports will attract a fine of AED 50,000.

The MOF has issued standard notification and report templates to help companies make their notifications.

The ESRs were first published in April 2019, with revised regulations released in August this year. The amendments clarified to whom the regulations apply and also gave notice that notifications would have to be submitted through the new portal, as well as making other minor changes such as what the ESRs consider to be relevant activities and what licensees performing such activities must demonstrate in terms of sufficient economic substance in the UAE.

We are processing your request. \n Thank you for your patience. An error occurred. This could be due to inactivity on the page - please try again.