On 20 October 2016 the OECD announced the establishment of the first series of bilateral relationships among jurisdictions committed to the automatic exchange of information from 2017. More than a thousand bilateral relationships are now in place globally to exchange financial account information in line with the Common Reporting Standard (CRS). Most of these bilateral relationships between countries are based on the Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement on Automatic Exchange of Financial Account Information (CRS MCAA).
The OECD notes that a total of 101 jurisdictions have agreed to commence the automatic exchange of financial account information under the CRS in September 2017 and September 2018. The exchange of financial account information is seen as a sign of the determination among countries to implement their commitment to combat tax evasion.
The OECD plans to release periodic updates on bilateral information exchange relationships and the next update is to be published before the end of 2016.
