CECABANK PARTNERS WITH WTAX / The bank launches a service to manage the legal tax claims of its customers.
Cecabank wants to expand its customer base in depositary and custodian services, a segment that is becoming increasingly competitive, especially due to the large international firms. To this end, it is working to expand the catalogue of value-added services it provides to its customers and in recent weeks has launched a new proposal for the comprehensive management of tax claims. As a result, Cecabank has signed a long-term agreement with WTax, the world's leading provider of tax refund services, to provide and facilitate direct processing solutions for Cecabank's custodian tax services.
The bank has begun to offer this solution to its existing fund managers, that is, those who have already deposited their assets with the bank and, depending on the type of vehicle (investment funds, pension funds, SICAV or voluntary contribution pension schemes, EPSV), it allows them to claim tax refunds in European markets where the case law of the Court of Justice of the European Union applies.
Profit
The new agreement signed with WTax will allow Cecabank's customers to have automatic access to enhanced tax refund mechanisms, including additional coverage within the tax services market. On a practical level, WTax will analyse in which situations fund managers can recover part of the withholding taxes applied to investments, which Cecabank expects will translate into an increase in the final return that fund managers offer their customers.
In addition, the bank expects a reduction in recovery times for fund managers, lower costs for banks, which will have this new service integrated into their already contracted offer, and greater operational efficiency.
Goal
"We seek to offer increasingly transparent services to our customers. The alliance with WTax is part of Cecabank's value-added strategy to offer enhanced services related to the Securities Services value chain, bringing customers one major step closer to optimising tax refund flows", explains Aurora Cuadros, Corporate Director of Securities Services at Cecabank. "This will give our customers the opportunity to add a greater level of predictability to their operational flows which ultimately contributes to bottom-line growth".
The ultimate goal is for Cecabank to "offer its customers access to withholding tax refunds in non-standard markets and ensure enhanced time-to-market delivery", explains Daniel Ginsburg, CEO of WTax.
