News in Brief, August 2026

DOMESTIC NEWS
 

• The draft amendment to Act No. 164/2013 Coll., on international cooperation in tax administration, has passed its first reading in the Chamber of Deputies. The amendment will enable the exchange of information under Pillar Two (DAC 9 for EU Member States and the multilateral GIR MCAA for non-EU jurisdictions). It also includes DAC 8, concerning the exchange of information on crypto-assets.
   
• The draft amendment to the Value Added Tax Act, implementing a part of the EU VAT in the Digital Age (ViDA) package, and the draft Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) Act have also passed their first reading.
   
• The Financial Administration has announced that, from 2028, it will take over the enforcement and administration of unpaid social security and health insurance contributions. In the first phase, the health insurance companies’ involvement will be voluntary. The measure forms part of legislative changes being prepared under the Platform Work Act.
   
• The Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs has submitted to the government an amendment to the Pension Insurance Act. The proposal contains several practical changes affecting senior citizens: it introduces regular increases of pensions from the age of 80, strengthens incentives for working seniors, and clarifies the rules for paying pensions abroad.
   
• An amendment to the AI Act has been published in the Official Journal of the European Union, aiming to simplify and clarify its implementation. At the same time, the European Commission has published the content of guidelines explaining the transparency obligations applicable to certain artificial intelligence systems.
   
• The Ministry of Industry and Trade has announced that a new state agency, CzechBusiness, will be established on 1 August, combining the existing responsibilities of CzechTrade and CzechInvest. Companies will thus have a single partner to support their development, from innovation through to international expansion.
   
• In July, the second meeting of the start-up tripartite took place at government level. The main topic was the Start-up Act, which is expected to be submitted for inter-ministerial comment procedure in the coming days, as well as other planned activities to support innovative entrepreneurship – extending the framework for employee shares, developing technology transfer, and incorporating the start-up agenda into the newly established CzechBusiness agency.
  
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• The following legislation was published in the Collection of Laws in July:
   
  • An act amending Act No. 240/2013 Coll., on investment companies and investment funds, effective from 1 September 2026.
     
  • Decree No. 134/2026 Coll. amending Decree No. 328/2015 Coll., implementing the Asylum Act and the Act on Temporary Protection of Foreign Nationals.

FOREIGN NEWS
 

• As at 3 July 2026, the OECD list of jurisdictions that have signed the multilateral agreement on the automatic exchange of information under the GloBE rules (GIR MCAA, Pillar Two) includes 38 jurisdictions: Australia, Austria, Barbados, Belgium, Czechia, Denmark, Finland, France, Gibraltar, Guernsey, Hong Kong, Croatia, Canada, Cyprus, Hungary, Germany, Ireland, the Isle of Man, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Greece, Romania, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and Turkey. The agreement will ensure the filing of a single information return and its subsequent exchange also for non-EU jurisdictions.
   
• The European Commission has announced developments in infringement procedures concerning the transposition of Directive (EU) 2025/872 (DAC 9). This directive provides a framework for the exchange of information from information returns within the EU. In January 2026, infringement procedures were launched against eleven EU member states that had failed to fully or partially notify the Commission of national measures transposing the directive into their national law. The Commission decided to send reasoned opinions to Belgium, Bulgaria and Cyprus, on the grounds that these three member states had not yet adopted or notified all the measures necessary for the full implementation of DAC 9. The infringement procedure remains open for a further six countries concerned, namely Czechia, Greece, Malta, the Netherlands, Poland and Portugal. The procedure was closed for Romania and Sweden.