I am committed to taking the necessary action to support retail investment in Ireland. Work is continuing on the roadmap for the taxation of retail investment announced in Budget 2026. The roadmap will be published in early 2026 and will set out an approach to simplify and adapt the tax framework to further support retail investment. This roadmap will facilitate due consideration of the Funds Sector 2030 Report, which made recommendations in relation to deemed disposal. It will also take into account the European Commission’s recommendation on Savings and Investment Accounts. I hope that further progress can be made across coming budgets to address some of the existing obstacles to greater retail investment, whilst maintaining important and necessary anti-avoidance measures.
Regarding the cost estimate of changes to deemed disposal, it is important to note that the information available to Revenue does not allow them to isolate the tax returned due to deemed disposal rules from other events which give rise to a tax liability. If it was assumed that all tax paid by funds in respect of unit holders, the tax paid by life companies in respect of policy holders and income tax accounted for by individuals in respect of their investments in Irish domiciled funds, offshore funds and life products were as a result of deemed disposal, removing deemed disposal could give rise to a potential cost of €284 million, based on the tax paid over the last eight years. As part of Budget 2026 an estimate was prepared for the Exchequer impact of deemed disposal not applying in a particular year, assuming that deemed disposal was closer to 50% of the total tax paid. This assumption results in an estimated full year cost to the Exchequer of €142 million for no tax arising from deemed disposal being paid in that year. However, the actual cost in a particular year could vary where the proportion of tax which is deemed disposal is higher or lower, or where the gains are larger or smaller than the eight year average used for this estimate.
