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From the district references, Fiscal Peace and the cancellation of obligations/ Malaj clarifies when the implementation will begin

2026-03-30 16:06:00, Ekonomi CNA

From the district references, Fiscal Peace and the cancellation of obligations/

The new reference prices in the districts are expected to be approved within April. Citizens or businesses seeking to revalue real estate with market values ??will need to use private licensors.

Minister of Finance Petrit Malaj, at today's press conference, explained for the first time the reasons why the revised district reference prices are not yet in force.

Minister Malaj said that their approval was postponed after the working group noticed differences between the prices declared in the cadastre and those from controls carried out at real estate agencies in the districts.

For interested citizens in districts seeking to carry out the revaluation process according to market values, Minister Malaj said that they should do it through a private licensor.

"The new reference prices for the districts are still in the process of being finalized and are expected to be completed by April 2026."

They were postponed after differences were observed between cadastral prices and those resulting from checks carried out at real estate agencies.

"Citizens can conduct the revaluation based on the real market price, through licensed private appraisers," Malaj asserted.

In the districts, the reference prices have been revised since last year, but have not yet been approved. Last year, the Ministry of Finance published a draft decision with the revised reference prices for the districts for public consultations. The reference prices for the 60 districts were approved in 2016 and there is still only one price, without subdivision into areas and without reflection of the current values ??of property sales.

Unlike the municipality of Tirana, which is divided into 32 cadastral zones, the 2016 reference prices are not used for the municipality of Tirana, as the values ??were revised at the end of July 2023.

For the districts, a new price map with an increase of up to 200% was initially proposed by the Ministry of Finance (the highest increase in the area near the port of Durrës), but it has not yet been approved by the Council of Ministers.

The draft decision was revised again, including prices for villages as separate areas. For the latter, the city price was currently used, but reduced by 35%.

For example, currently the reference price for the city of Durrës is 67,500 lekë per square meter. In the new draft decision published for public consultation in July 2025, it is proposed that Durrës be divided into 13 cadastral zones for reference prices, with values ??ranging from 45 thousand lekë to 200 thousand lekë per square meter (the 200 thousand lekë price is for the Port area where the “Durrës Yachts Marina” project is being built).

In Durrës, the cadastral area itself has also been proposed for the first line of construction in the villages of Gjirin i Lalzit and Hamallaj with a value of 190 thousand lekë per square meter. For the villages of Himara, such as Dhërmi and Palasë, references have been proposed with a value of 140 thousand lekë/m2. In the village of Vuno, the reference price will be 100 thousand lekë and in Livadh 81 thousand lekë/m2.

Fiscal peace and the law on the cancellation of obligations, Malaj: The bylaws are being consulted with international

Although about 2 months have passed since their entry into force, the implementation of 2 laws of the fiscal package has not yet begun: "On the Fiscal Peace Agreement" and "On the payment and cancellation/extinguishment of tax liabilities, customs duties payable, as well as the procedure for removing means of transport from circulation after the cancellation/extinguishment of tax liabilities".

Minister of Finance Petrit Malaj explained at today's press conference that the bylaws for both laws have been completed and have been sent to international partners for consultation.

"Regarding fiscal peace and debt forgiveness, all relevant bylaws and instructions have been completed by the Ministry of Finance. Since these were two very controversial laws, we have forwarded the bylaws to our international partners. As soon as we receive a response from our international partners, we will immediately proceed with their publication and without question with the full implementation of the law on both fiscal peace and debt forgiveness," said Malaj.

Both laws were published in the Official Gazette on January 15 and entered into force on January 30 (15 days after publication), but are not yet being implemented because the bylaws have not been approved.

More specifically, the deadlines for the publication of sub-legal acts are: The instruction of the law "On the payment and cancellation/extinguishment of tax liabilities, duties payable to customs, as well as the procedure for removing from circulation means of transport after the cancellation/extinguishment of tax liabilities" is expected to be published within 15 days from the entry into force of this law. The minister responsible for finance issues an instruction for its implementation.

While the law "On the Fiscal Agreement" stipulates that the minister responsible for finance is tasked with approving, within 3 months from the entry into force of this law, the sub-legal acts implementing articles 10, point 3, and 11, point 4, of this law.

The law also stipulates that the Director General of Taxes is tasked with approving, within 3 months from the entry into force of this law, the instruction implementing point 1 of Article 11 of this law.

Before the adoption of the Fiscal Peace Agreement law, there was opposition from the IMF, the EU, and the American Chamber of Commerce, as they believed the legislation encouraged money laundering.

What do the Fiscal Peace Agreement and Debt Cancellation Laws Provide?

The Law "On the Cancellation, Extinction and Payment of Tax Liabilities to the Central Tax Administration and Duties Payable to Customs" establishes the full cancellation of unpaid Tax and Customs liabilities by December 31, 2014.

The amnesty will not include social security and health insurance contribution obligations. For contributions, the law only stipulates the cancellation of fines and late payment interest accrued until December 31, 2014. Self-employed people in agriculture will also be a beneficiary category.

In addition to the complete cancellation of debts over 10 years unpaid, the law also provides for the forgiveness of newer debts, but on the condition that a portion of the debt is paid.

For liabilities belonging to the period from January 1, 2015 to December 31, 2019, taxpayers can benefit from partial cancellation on the condition that if they pay 50% of the liability by June 30, 2026, the remaining part is deleted. If they pay 75% of the liability by December 31, 2026 in monthly installments, the remaining 25% is automatically deleted. In both cases, fines and late payment interest for the relevant periods are completely deleted.

For liabilities incurred from January 1, 2020 to December 31, 2024, the cancellation of fines and late payment interest is only possible if the principal is paid in full by December 31, 2026. The same scheme also applies to social security and health insurance contributions, including self-employed persons in agriculture, provided that 100% of the contribution is paid within the specified deadline.

The law stipulates that administrative penalties (fines and late fees) for social and health insurance that belong to the tax periods from January 1, 2015 to December 31, 2024, which result in being registered in the taxpayer's account, including self-employed persons in agriculture, are abolished, provided that 100% of the contribution is paid by 31.12.2026.

Businesses have 100 million lek or about 1 billion euros in unpaid taxes and customs duties by 2014. The figure for unpaid debts by businesses by 2014, which is expected to be completely eliminated, was made public by Finance Minister Petrit Malaj at the previous meeting of the Parliamentary Committee on Legal Affairs.

The Law "On the Fiscal Peace Agreement" enables the signing of an agreement between large businesses with gross income over 14 million lek per year and the tax administration for the prepayment of corporate tax.

Any regular business, whether a natural person or an entity, can voluntarily enter into this agreement with the tax administration. Excluded from the right to enter into an agreement with the tax administration are businesses against which a criminal case has been opened for fraud or tax evasion.

During this 1-year agreement (with the right to renew up to 2 times), businesses with gross income over 14 million lek per year will be charged a tax advance on an increased taxable base. So the business will not pay any tax in advance, but will be charged on the taxable base consisting of the taxable profit of the previous year plus an 18% increase. If the actual profit at the end of the year exceeds the limit (calculating the profit of the previous year plus an additional margin of 18%), 5% will be paid on this increase.

So essentially the agreement does not change the profit tax rate which is 23% for businesses with net income over 14 million lekë, but increases the taxable base, as the tax will be calculated on the previous year's profit plus an additional margin of 18%. Only for profit exceeding this estimated level, an additional 5% tax is paid.

In exchange, businesses will benefit from the exemption from tax audits for the period of implementation of the agreement.

In addition to prepaying the tax against non-audit for 1 year, large businesses that will enter into the Fiscal Peace agreement with the tax administration will also have the opportunity to re-declare the financial statements of the last 5 years, against a 5% tax.

The 5% tax will be applied to changes such as: revaluation of cash balances, writing off fictitious assets or liabilities, declaring previously undisclosed assets, redeclaring retained earnings and distributing them as dividends.

For all these cases, there will be no fines, interest or late fees, provided that the taxpayer declares in advance that he will benefit from the agreement./ Monitor Magazine