Singapore ready to embark on automatic exchange of financial account information relationship with Indonesia

SINGAPORE is ready to embark on a new bilateral relationship with Indonesia that facilitates the automatic exchange of financial account information.

The city-state's Ministry of Finance said in a Wednesday release that it is ready to have an Automatic Exchange of Financial Account Information ("AEOI") relationship with Indonesia. "This is in line with our consistent position for a level playing field with respect to other key financial centres," it said in a media release.

Following Singapore's signing of the Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement (MCAA) on the AEOI under the Common Reporting Standard (CRS) on June 21, Singapore has listed Indonesia as one of its intended partners under the MCAA.

The MCAA is a multilateral framework agreement that provides a standardised and efficient mechanism to facilitate the automatic exchange of financial account information, and avoids the need for separate bilateral competent authority agreements to be concluded.

Reciprocal exchange of information can commence after committed jurisdictions have introduced the necessary laws to implement CRS and the required confidentiality and data protection safeguards are in place. The confidentiality and data protection safeguards is an international requirement set out by the Global Forum on Transparency and Exchange of Information for Tax Purposes.

"We have been working closely together with our Indonesian counterparts to ensure that both parties can commence reciprocal exchange of information," said the release.