Tax consultancy costs for determining the capital gain

The fee for the tax advisor who determines and declares the capital gain from the sale of a company share is one of the deductible costs of sale.

In contrast to the past, tax consultancy costs are now only tax deductible if they are to be regarded as income-related expenses or operating expenses. A tax office therefore did not want to allow the sellers to deduct the associated tax consultancy costs for the calculation and declaration of the capital gain from the sale of shares in a corporation. The tax office justified this by stating that the costs were not caused by the sale of the shares, but by the fulfillment of tax obligations.

The Hesse Fiscal Court has now contradicted this. Even if one senate of the Federal Fiscal Court has interpreted the term "disposal costs" very restrictively, the other senates interpret the term more generously. Accordingly, the decisive factor is not that the costs are directly related to the sale of shares, but whether there is a causal connection with this sale of shares. As this is the case here, the tax consultancy costs are also to be counted as disposal costs.