The FC Barcelona could confront to a new judicial problem

In the middle of an economic and institutional crisis with the vote of censorship against of the managerial blaugrana, chaired by Josep María Bartomeu, the Barça could confront to a new judicial problem. Now, Giovanni Pitruzzella, General Lawyer of the Court of European Justice (TUE), has asked that it cancel the sentence that rid to four teams of Spain, between them the Barcelona, to pay some no paid taxes.

Of agreement to Pitruzella, the FC Barcelona, Real Madrid, Athletic Club and Osasuna have seen benefited of a presumptive fiscal deal favourable, after having remained exentos of the general obligation to transform in sportive anonymous society. Thus, it has recommended to the TUE that value the resource that interposed the European Commission and go back to study the case.

In the year 1990, the Law of the Sport, in his article 19, established that "the clubs, or his professional teams, that participate in sportive competitions officials of professional character and state field will adopt the form of Sportive anonymous society". However, by means of an additional disposal in said Law, allowed that the clubs that in 1990 had presented balance patrimonial positive from the season 1985/86 did not turn into SAD, being the case of the FC Barcelona, Real Madrid, Athletic Club and Osasuna.

In 2016, the community Executive had asked to seven Spanish clubs (Barcelona, Real Madrid, Athletic, Osasuna, Valencia, Elche and Hercules), the return of more than 68 million euros by supposedly have benefited of illegal fiscal helps. In the case of the first four, Brussels defended the deal differentiated since these clubs enjoyed during 20 years of an advantageous fiscal type of 25% (in front of 30% of the rest of teams), that yes had to turn into sportive anonymous societies, fulfilling the article in 1990.

However, afterwards the General Court of the European Union valued the resource that had presented the lawyers of the Barcelona and finished cancelling the decision of the Commission. In fact, they estimated that from Brussels had not inspected the importance that has the deduction by reinversión of extraordinary profits that foresees in the fiscal diet in the sector of the professional football.

It is thus that the community Executive resorted to this sentence in front of the upper instance, the Court of Justice of the European Union. Pitruzzela Has proposed that it consider cancel the previous sentence of the General Court and that the subject was him given back so that it go back to pronounce on the same.

His conclusions are not vinculantes

The indictments of Pitruzzella will not influence in the future court's decision of Luxembourg. However, it underlined that the diet was not of "individual helps" but a "diet of helps", reason by which the Commission Europe could limit to study the characteristics of the same without having to inspect each one of the cases with the aim to evaluate the existence help of illegal State.

On the other hand, the General Lawyer considers that Brussels can not descartar that, when applying the fiscal deductions, the clubs involved would have enjoyed an imposición lower to the one of the rest. In this sense, Pitruzzela determines that it could have existed an illegal help, even if it had taken into account the fiscal deductions.