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Miles Dean considers the potential implications of the Spanish tax authorities’ pursuit of tax from high-profile footballers.
The news that Marcelo the Real Madrid defender pleaded guilty to defrauding the Spanish state of €490 000 and received a fine of €750 000 and suspended jail sentence of four months will be of little surprise to those who have been following the raids by the country’s tax administration (AEAT) on footballers in recent years. Like many before Marcelo had used a non-Spanish company to exploit his image rights with the intention of preventing the income being taxable in Spain.
Footballers and image rights are a dangerous cocktail especially when others may be stirring the mix. It appears Marcelo has been hard done by given that he had settled his tax debts in 2013 which he might have expected to be the end of the story. However the AEAT reopened the case on new grounds this time targeting his...
