Xavi beats Treasury again

The National Court (AN) has once again annulled a tax settlement from the Tax Agency for the coach of Fútbol Club Barcelona, ​​Xavi Hernández, this time for 369,722 euros, which is added to the one revoked last March and for the same reason: the Treasury used a wrong method when calculating how many taxes it had to pay in relation to image rights.

The Central Economic-Administrative Court (TEAC), attached to the Ministry of Finance, dismissed Xavi’s claims against that liquidation in 2019, for which the former Barcelona soccer player appealed and now the National Court has given him, again, the reason. This is how the Contentious Chamber expresses it in a sentence, dated April 26, to which Europa Press has had access.

Dictated by the magistrate Rafael Villafáñez and in 10 pages, the Contentious Chamber concludes that the Tax Agency used a “subsidiary method, without sufficient justification of the impossibility of applying the main ones”, when quantifying the taxes to be paid to the public coffers, as Corporation Tax and for the years 2013 and 2014, by Galileu 136, Xavi’s company and to which he had assigned his image rights.

The Treasury used the method of distribution of results for the inspection, considered “incomplete” the documentation provided by the former soccer player’s company and agreed to a penalty of 602,222 euros. However, the AN, as it did on the previous occasion, points out that other forms of calculation have priority, such as the compared free price, the increased cost and the resale price.

In March, the Court’s Contentious Chamber already overturned another TEAC resolution on Xavi. According to the tax inspection, Galileu 136, the company associated with the former soccer player, had to pay the State almost one million euros in taxes between 2009 and 2012.

Xavi alleged that the Tax Agency had mixed the money that he had received during those years as a Barcelona player with the income obtained through other entities.

Andre Iniesta and Puyol

The now coach based his appeal on a previous ruling by one of his former teammates, Andrés Iniesta, who in February the Court annulled a settlement of 200,863 euros for the same reason, that is, that the Tax Agency had not explained why its method was appropriate. Iniesta was also revoked, in March, another for 2,014,013 euros.

Another partner of both, Carles Puyol, suffered the same fate after appealing the decision of the TEAC on an inspection that ordered him to pay 1,711,115 euros for the period 2010-2014.

In all cases, the Contentious Chamber of the Court has been shielded, to annul the resolutions of the TEAC, in the lack of justification of the method of fiscal calculation chosen by Treasury.