Andrés Báez Moreno wins the 8th IBFD Frans Vanistendael Award


AMSTERDAM, May 12, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- IBFD is delighted to announce that Andrés Báez Moreno (Spain) is the winner of the 8th IBFD Frans Vanistendael Award for his article titled “Because Not Always B Comes After A: Critical Reflections on the New Article 12B of the UN Model on Automated Digital Services”, published by IBFD in World Tax Journal, volume 13, no. 4.

The article provides a comprehensive analysis that may assist many developing countries to perceive the implications of article 12B of the UN Model, showing how the nuances and dividing line from article 12A were sufficient and that article 12B may introduce asymmetries between the two articles.

The arguments contained in the article are the most comprehensive analysis of this topic and also promote the studies of the UN Model.

Meticulously examining the history and the progression of the work in the committees and sub-committees of the UN group of experts and analysing the prevailing modes of interpretation of tax treaties, he questions the logic of leaving out of the Commentary “services of a routine nature” from the scope of application of article 12A, thereby also precluding the application of the withholding mechanism in respect of automated digital services by source countries. This interpretation in turn, necessitated, as the author asserts, a separate article 12B to deal with such services. The author hints that it was perhaps a deliberately designed interpretative obstacle to make article 12A less effective.

While designing a simplistic solution to the intractable problem of taxation of the digital economy in the absence of physical presence in article 12B, many inconsistencies cropped up. These are deliberated on in detail by the author, with the result that the application of the new article itself becomes tenuous besides seriously jeopardizing, by its very existence, the application of article 12A to digital services.

For these reasons, the jury concluded that the article deserved winning the 8th Frans Vanistendael Award.

Andrés Báez Moreno is an associate professor of tax law at the Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (Spain) and an independent tax consultant, and lawyer at the Madrid Bar. He has worked on domestic, international and EU tax issues as a teacher, author and consultant for over 20 years. Moreover, he has also acted as IBFD postdoctoral research fellow in the past.

The award ceremony took place in Amsterdam on 6 May 2022, in the framework of an in memoriam event for Frans Vanistendael. His spouse, Rosa Vanistendael, personally delivered the award to Andrés Báez Moreno.

IBFD welcomes applications for the 9th IBFD Frans Vanistendael Award to ibfd.award@ibfd.org. by 31 December 2022. All articles, book chapters and books on international (including European) tax law published in 2022 are eligible. The conferral of the 9th Frans Vanistendael Award will take place at IBFD’s headquarters in Amsterdam in May 2023.

If you would like further details, please contact Phil Windus, Senior Marketing Coordinator, at p.windus@ibfd.org.

About the 8th Frans Vanistendael Award
The IBFD Frans Vanistendael Award for International Tax Law was established to promote worldwide excellence in research on international tax law.

The jury for the 8th Frans Vanistendael Award was composed of Cécile Brokelind, Tsilly Dagan, Cliff Fleming, Rick Krever, Jörg Manfred Mössner, Pasquale Pistone (Chairman), Jennifer Roeleveld, Luis Schoueri and Dikshit Sengupta.

The previous winners of the Frans Vanistendael Award are John Avery Jones with Jürgen Lüdicke, Wolfgang Schön, Romero Tavares, Tsilly Dagan, Aitor Navarro, Brian Arnold and Adolfo Martín Jiménez.

About IBFD
IBFD is a leading international provider of cross-border tax expertise, with a long-standing history of supporting and contributing to tax research and academic activities. As an independent foundation, IBFD utilizes its global network of tax experts and its Knowledge Centre to serve Fortune 500 companies, governments, international consultancy firms and tax advisers.

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Andrés Báez Moreno wins the 8th IBFD Frans Vanistendael Award