Already last year, it was noticeable that after several years of decline, the Hungarian Tax Authority conducts more and more tax audits. In 2022, the number of tax audits increased by 6.2% compared to the previous year. Experience shows that this trend is expected to continue even more strongly this year. The most commonly audited tax category remains VAT.

From time to time, there’s news of companies introducing four-day work week. Magyar Telekom has been mentioned several times as the first big fish to do so, but Libri, too, has apparently done the same, as have various local subsidiaries of foreign parent companies. The obvious question is whether this option is available to everyone and, if so, at what price.

Whichever product or service you are discussing, there are certain names, images or slogans that immediately come to mind. When setting up a business, it is crucial for any founder that the brand they represent has a distinctive, recognizable, ringing name. Building a solid business reputation is a long and bumpy road, but safeguarding legal protection for a brand name or logo to ensure exclusivity is much easier than many people think: the solution lies in trademark protection.

The yearbook of the Hungarian tax authority summarising the most important tax events and statistics for 2022 has been published. It shows, among other things, the number of fines imposed and the effectiveness with which the tax authority's decisions can be challenged. We have compiled the most important and informative figures from the yearbook.

In 2016, when local authorities had been able to levy municipal taxes for more than a year already, we summarised the lessons that had been learned up to then from this newest genre of local taxes. At the time, we were waiting with bated breath to see what the future would bring, that is; to see just how creative local governments would get in thinking up new taxes. So what did ever happen to the ‘kitsch tax’, the ‘pony tax’ and all those other local levies? Now that a few years have passed, the time has come for us to once again peer into the weird and wonderful world of municipal taxes.

For decades, the SAFE contract type in the US has facilitated the raising of capital for start-ups with high future potential. Meanwhile, under Hungarian law, the same can currently only be done in a cumbersome and circuitous way. However, a recent amendment proposal seeks to fill this gap.

On 20 April 2023, after a long wait, the European Parliament voted in favour of the so-called MiCA regulation on crypto asset markets, which will be the first comprehensive set of rules covering this area in the EU. However, it remains to be seen what impact the new regulation will have on the crypto market.

Under a law passed by Parliament yesterday, all companies with more than 50 employees will be obliged to have a whistleblowing system in place from December. Employers with 250 employees cannot wait any longer, as they will have 60 days to implement the system. The question is, of course, whether companies will see the regulation as another unnecessary administrative burden or whether it will trigger an avalanche of internal investigations.