Germany · Tax regime
Exit taxation (Wegzugsbesteuerung, §6 AStG)
Substantially widened from 1 January 2025: the Annual Tax Act 2025 extended exit taxation to units in investment funds and special investment funds via new provisions in §19 and §49 InvStG, mirroring the §6 AStG rules that previously applied only to corporate shareholdings.
The 2025 extension to investment funds is the change almost nobody has priced. Historically the exit tax was a founder's problem — you needed 1% of an operating company to be caught. From 2025 a purely passive investor holding EUR 500,000 or more of acquisition cost in a single fund or ETF is caught on the same deemed-disposal basis. A large, conventionally diversified portfolio can now trigger German exit tax on departure with no operating business anywhere in sight.
The facts
- Total landed cost
- A deemed disposal of unrealised gains on departure, taxed as if sold the day before emigration. On a EUR 20m unrealised gain in a qualifying shareholding this is a seven-figure charge on money you never received
- Physical presence
- Applies where the individual has been subject to unlimited German tax liability for at least 7 of the previous 12 years
- Family
- individual — but note that gifts and inheritances to non-resident family members are themselves trigger events
- Permanent residency
- n/a
- Citizenship
- n/a
- Dual citizenship
- Permitted
- Requirements
- unlimited German tax liability for at least 7 of the previous 12 yearsshareholding of 1% or more in a corporation (§17 EStG), or since 2025 investment fund units where holding is at least 1% of the fund or acquisition cost is at least EUR 500,000an exit event: emigration, gift or inheritance to a non-resident, or loss of German taxing rights
- Since 1 January 2025 fund units are in scope where the taxpayer held at least 1% of the fund's units in the last five years OR acquisition costs of the relevant units reach EUR 500,000. The EUR 500,000 acquisition-cost test is the trap: it catches ordinary ETF investors, not just insiders.
- The classic §6 AStG trigger is a shareholding of 1% or more in a corporation under §17 EStG, held by someone subject to unlimited German tax liability for at least 7 of the last 12 years. That 7-of-12 test is short — a family arriving in Germany crosses it during a single school cycle.
- The charge is on unrealised gains. There is no cash to pay it with, which is precisely why it deters departure.
- Interest-free indefinite deferral for EU/EEA moves was abolished for exits from 2022. The current regime offers instalment payment over seven years, generally against security. Grandfathering for pre-2022 exits is a specialist question.
- Gifts and inheritances to non-resident relatives are exit events in their own right. Succession planning that moves shares to a child living abroad can trigger the tax without anybody moving.
- Return within the statutory window can cancel the charge, but relying on that means committing to come back — a poor foundation for a relocation plan.
- Germany offers no offsetting tax regime. There is no non-dom status, no expat ruling, no forfait. You get the full 47.475% and the exit tax on the way out.