Tax fraud, maxi-seizure of 110 million in tax credits in Rome
The financiers of the Provincial Command of Rome have carried out a provision of urgent preventive seizure issued by the capitoline prosecutor for over 110 million euros of tax credits related to support measures enacted by the government during the most acute phase of the health emergency from Covid-19 to help businesses and traders in need. The survey originates from a developed risk analysis by the Revenue Agency on the amount of the “bonuses” provided for by the decrees “Relaunch” And “Care Italy“of 2020, connected to the rental costs of properties for non-residential use and recognized in the form of tax credits in an amount equal to a percentage of the royalties actually paid (up to 60%).
The crime hypothesis is that of fraud. The tax benefits in question can be directly used to offset tax debts, or transferred, even in part and more times, for the same purpose, by communicating – both the transferor and the transferee – through the “credit transfer” IT platform made available. by the Agency. The investigations highlighted the alleged fictitiousness of the tax credits, which were transferred through a website to a company – based in the capital but operating throughout Italy – which proposed itself online as a legal entity capable of making customers obtain “liquidity through the immediate release of tax credits deriving from special regulations “, by purchasing and paying them immediately after having carried out – as stated – documentary checks on their authenticity, and then in turn transferring them to third parties, for a fee.
In the first ten months of 2021, the company in question purchased tax credits for a nominal value of over 110 million euros by a multitude of subjects who, based on preliminary findings, would be devoid of entrepreneurial consistency or, in any case, could not benefit from the aforementioned tax concessions. Among the inconsistencies found, hypotheses emerged in which the data of entrepreneurs for whom no lease contract was registered in the period of interest was entered into the IT platform managed by the Financial Administration, or that, in the face of tax returns submitted for modest amounts, they would incur rental costs of hundreds of thousands of euros per year.
The investigations also made it possible to find that part of the tax credits, for a nominal value of 44 million euros, was sold by the company to a series of natural and legal persons, attracted by the possibility of purchase “spendable” bonuses at a discount on their face value; for about 10 million euros, it was even “monetized” through the sale to financial intermediaries. In order to stop the circulation of credits, the public prosecutor issued an emergency precautionary measure, relating to the corporate shares and corporate assets of the Roman company, to the website through which it promoted its business and to the entire amount of the credits. of which it still owns or has already sold. The hypothesized crime is that of fraud, aimed at defrauding both third parties in good faith and the Treasury.
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