A lawyer in Turkey advising a foreign investor or a returning national who holds assets abroad now has a complete procedure to work from, not only a statute. On 4 June 2026, Law No. 7582 was published in the Official Gazette No. 33270 and inserted Provisional Article 19 into the Corporate Tax Law (Law No. 5520), reopening the mechanism known in Turkish practice as Varlık Barışı, the wealth amnesty. On 4 July 2026, the Ministry of Treasury and Finance published the General Communiqué on Bringing Certain Assets into the Economy (Series No. 1) in the Official Gazette No. 33300, with three annexes: the declaration form, the commitment form, and the bank's return. In plain terms, individuals and companies may declare money, gold, foreign currency, securities, and other capital market instruments held abroad, or held in Turkey but absent from their statutory books, to a Turkish bank until 31 July 2027, pay a rate that runs from five per cent down to zero depending on a holding commitment, bring the assets into Turkey within two months, and obtain protection against tax examination and assessment on the declared amounts. This guide sets out the statute, the Communiqué, and its eight worked examples, and explains how a foreign client should sequence a declaration. It is part of the firm's wider treatment of the 2026 tax package.
What the 2026 Wealth Amnesty Provides, and What the Communiqué Added on 4 July 2026
An Istanbul Law Firm starts with the statute, because the Communiqué builds on it rather than replacing it. Provisional Article 19 of the Corporate Tax Law allows real and legal persons to declare, by 31 July 2027, money, gold, foreign currency, securities, and other capital market instruments that are held abroad, and allows income and corporate taxpayers to declare the same categories of asset where they are held in Turkey but do not appear in their statutory books. The President may extend the declaration period in further periods of up to one year in total. A rate is charged on the declared value, collected by the bank or intermediary institution at source, and reduced according to how long the declarant commits to hold the assets in defined instruments. In return, no tax examination or assessment is made in respect of the declared amounts, within limits the statute sets. The Communiqué was issued under the eleventh paragraph of the Article, which authorises the Ministry to determine the procedure.
A Turkish Law Firm then sets out what the Communiqué settled, because these are the points a client could not have known from the statute alone. It fixed the declaration channel: foreign assets are declared to banks, or to intermediary institutions only in the case of securities and other capital market instruments, on the form in Annex 1, in two copies, and never to the tax office directly. It confirmed that a declaration may be made by an authorised proxy or legal representative. It made each calendar month a separate taxation period, so that more than one declaration may be made before the deadline, and it set precise rules for correcting a declaration within the same month and in later months. It published the rate table with the half-point increase for declarations made from 1 January 2027 and the full one-point increase for any extension period, and it made the Annex 2 commitment form a condition of any reduced rate. It fixed the two-month window for transfer to Turkey, the treatment of assets carried in physically, the ten-day window for converting declared assets into the committed instrument, the valuation rules, the bookkeeping and special fund account requirements, and the exact conditions of the audit protection. The Communiqué entered into force on publication.
An English speaking lawyer in Turkey also places the 2026 programme in its line, because the structure is recognisable to anyone who has handled earlier Turkish amnesties. Turkey has legislated wealth amnesties repeatedly since 2008, through a sequence of laws that varied the rates, deadlines and holding conditions, and the 2026 programme follows that pattern with its own rate scale and window. What is new in 2026 is the depth of the commitment-based reduction, which runs all the way to zero for a five-year holding, and the degree of procedural detail the Communiqué supplies. The lesson from the earlier programmes is consistent: the most favourable treatment is reserved for early, committed declarations, and the protection is unavailable once an examination has begun. A client weighing whether to declare should decide deliberately and early. Practice may vary by authority and year, and the Communiqué is the current reference point for every procedural question.
Who Can Declare and Which Assets Qualify
Turkish lawyers who screen a client for the amnesty begin with the asset categories, because the statute is closed on this point. The qualifying assets are money, gold, foreign currency, securities, and other capital market instruments. Real estate is outside the scope of the amnesty, and so is any other asset not in those five categories. The Communiqué does, however, open a route for a client whose foreign wealth is held in an excluded form: under Article 5(4), an out-of-scope foreign asset, and the Communiqué gives real estate as its example, may be converted into an in-scope asset by 31 July 2027 and the resulting money, currency or instrument then declared and brought to Turkey under the amnesty. A client who owns a foreign property and wishes to use the amnesty can therefore sell the property before the deadline and declare the proceeds, provided the sale, the proceeds and the declared asset can be connected by contract, bank record and account movement if the connection is later questioned.
A lawyer in Turkey then addresses who may declare, because the Communiqué widens the picture well beyond a person declaring their own account. Real and legal persons may declare foreign assets, and income and corporate taxpayers may declare unrecorded domestic assets. Under Article 6(2), persons with no income or corporate tax liability at all, taxpayers who are not required to keep books, and income taxpayers who wish to declare personal assets without connecting them to their business may all declare domestic assets, provided those assets are deposited in a bank or intermediary account by the declaration date and the deposit is evidenced. Under Article 6(3), ordinary partnerships and sole proprietorships, which are registered for VAT and withholding but not for income or corporate tax, may also declare, and the resulting protection covers VAT at the partnership level and income or corporate tax at the partner level.
An Istanbul Law Firm pays particular attention to Article 8, because it solves the problem most often encountered in family and closely held company structures. Assets that belong to a company or its shareholders but are held abroad in the name of the company's legal representatives, its shareholders, or persons authorised to manage them under a power of attorney or representation agreement executed before 4 June 2026 may be declared in the company's name and brought to Turkey or recorded in its books. Assets belonging to a company or its shareholders but held by third parties outside that circle may likewise be declared in the company's name. And assets belonging to a natural person but held by a foreign company of which that person is a shareholder or representative may be declared in the person's own name. In each of these cases the Communiqué adds a condition that a client should take seriously: if an examination is later opened for reasons unconnected with the declaration, the declarant must be able to prove that the assets did in fact belong to the company, the shareholders, or the person in whose name they were declared. The bank will not ask for that proof at declaration; an examiner may ask for it years later. Practice may vary by authority and year, and the ownership evidence should be assembled before the declaration rather than after a query.
How a Foreign Asset Is Declared: The Form, the Bank, and the Monthly Period
A Turkish Law Firm describes the mechanics exactly as the Communiqué sets them out, because the client's protection depends on following them. Foreign assets are declared on the Annex 1 form, prepared in two copies and submitted to a bank or, for securities and capital market instruments only, to an intermediary institution. The bank or intermediary enters the details of any account opened for the declaration on one copy, certifies it, and returns it to the declarant together with the receipt or transaction form; that certified copy is the declarant's evidence of having declared. Under Article 4(3) the bank requests no documents from the declarant about the declared assets, so the declaration itself is a simple filing. The bank does, however, verify the authority of any proxy or legal representative who files on the declarant's behalf. The declaration window opened on 4 June 2026 and closes on 31 July 2027, inclusive, unless extended.
An English speaking lawyer in Turkey explains the monthly structure, because it governs how a declaration can be changed. The Communiqué states that a single declaration is the norm, but because each month in which a declaration is made is treated as a separate taxation period, a declarant may make more than one declaration before the deadline. Within the same month, a correction to the first declaration is the only route to changing it: a declarant who filed on 10 August 2026 for assets worth 15,000,000 lira and wishes within August to reduce the figure to 7,500,000 or raise it to 22,500,000 files a correction, and where the figure is reduced the bank may refund the tax collected on the excess. In a later month, a reduction is still possible but only within the two-month transfer window, by correction through the bank, which passes the correction to the tax office against the return it filed; once the assets have been transferred or deposited, no reduction and no refund is possible. An increase in a later month is never a correction: the declarant files a new declaration for the additional amount only, and the new declaration is not connected with the earlier one. Any filing outside these correction rules is treated as a new declaration.
An Istanbul Law Firm underlines the closing rule of this part of the Communiqué, because it is absolute. Under Article 3(4)(e), no correction request is considered after the declaration period ends; a declaration made before 31 July 2027 cannot be increased, reduced or corrected after that date. For a client who is still assembling a picture of foreign holdings, this argues for declaring in tranches as each holding is confirmed rather than waiting to declare everything at once near the deadline, because an under-declaration discovered after the window closes cannot be remedied and an over-declaration cannot be refunded. Each tranche carries its own two-month transfer deadline, its own tax payment, and its own commitment, which should be tracked separately. Practice may vary by authority and year, and the bank's own procedures for processing corrections should be confirmed at the time of filing.
The Rate Scale: From Five Per Cent to Zero, and the Annex 2 Commitment
A lawyer in Turkey sets out the rate scale as the Communiqué publishes it, because it is the core economics of the decision. The default rate is five per cent of the declared value, collected by the bank or intermediary at the time of declaration. Where the declarant commits to hold the declared assets in time deposits or participation accounts, in government domestic debt securities or lease certificates issued under Law No. 4749, or in venture capital investment funds, the rate falls with the commitment period: four per cent for at least one year, three per cent for at least two years, two per cent for at least three years, one per cent for at least four years, and zero for at least five years. For declarations made between 1 January 2027 and 31 July 2027, half a point is added to each of these rates, so that the one-year rate becomes four and a half per cent and the five-year rate becomes half a per cent. If the deadline is extended by presidential decision, declarations made in the extension period carry a further half point, for a total increase of one point over the base scale.
A Turkish Law Firm then describes the conditions attached to the reduced rates, because the commitment is a formal act with consequences. To obtain any reduced rate the declarant must deliver the commitment form in Annex 2 to the bank or intermediary at the time of declaration; the commitment is exempt from stamp duty. Even where the rate is zero, the declared assets are included in the bank's return. The commitment period does not run from the date of declaration; under Article 4(8) it runs from the date on which the declared assets are actually placed in the time deposit, government security, lease certificate or venture capital fund. And under Article 9(7) the declarant must convert the declared amount into the committed instrument within ten days, counted from the date of transfer or deposit for foreign assets and from the date of declaration for domestic assets. The ten-day window is short, and a client who declares before the banking arrangements for the committed instrument are in place risks missing it.
An English speaking lawyer in Turkey works through the Communiqué's own examples, because they fix the arithmetic. In Example 2, an individual declares foreign currency worth 10,000,000 lira on 15 September 2026 and commits to hold it in a time deposit for at least two years; the rate is three per cent, the bank collects 300,000 lira at declaration and declares and pays it to the tax office as withholding agent by the fifteenth of the following month. In Example 3, a company declares 25,000,000 lira of foreign assets on 20 November 2026 with a five-year time deposit commitment; the rate is zero, no tax is collected, and the assets still appear in the bank's return. In Example 4, an individual declares 8,000,000 lira on 5 February 2027 with a one-year lease certificate commitment; because the declaration falls after 1 January 2027, the four per cent rate becomes four and a half per cent and the tax is 360,000 lira. The bank's return is the Annex 3 form, filed by the fifteenth of the month following the declaration and paid within the same period. The tax paid under the amnesty cannot be deducted as an expense and cannot be credited against any other tax. Practice may vary by authority and year, and the exact rate for a particular declaration should be confirmed against the date of filing and the commitment given.
Bringing the Assets to Turkey: The Two-Month Rule and Physical Import
A Turkish Law Firm treats the transfer requirement as the condition that most often decides whether the protection survives, because the Communiqué makes it a hard deadline. Under Article 5(1), assets declared as held abroad must be transferred, within two months of the date of declaration, to an existing or newly opened account at a Turkish bank or intermediary institution. The period runs separately for each declaration from its own date, so a declaration on 10 August 2026 must be matched by a transfer by 10 October 2026, as the Communiqué's Example 1 illustrates in its correction scenario. The bank receipt or the intermediary's transaction form evidences the transfer. Where the assets are not transferred in time, the bank reports the failure to the tax office that received its return, and the consequences described below follow.
An Istanbul Law Firm pays particular attention to assets carried into Turkey physically, because the Communiqué's rule is tighter than most clients expect. Under Article 5(2), money, gold or other assets brought in physically must clear customs within the two-month window and must be deposited with a Turkish bank or intermediary by the end of the first business day after the customs formalities are completed. The Customs Administration will ask, at the point of entry, for the document showing that the assets were declared to a bank or intermediary, so the Annex 1 declaration and the bank's certified copy must exist before the assets travel. The customs document then serves as evidence that the assets were brought into Turkey and must be produced to the bank at deposit. Customs reports these entries electronically to the Revenue Administration by the end of the following month. A client who intends to carry gold or cash should plan the sequence as declaration, then travel, then same-day or next-business-day deposit, and should not treat the two-month window as the only deadline.
An English speaking lawyer in Turkey also notes a flexibility the Communiqué grants, which matters in family and corporate structures. Under Article 5(3), it makes no difference to the application of the amnesty that the person transferring the assets from abroad and the account holder or declarant in Turkey are different persons. A declaration by a Turkish company of assets held abroad in a shareholder's name, or a declaration by an individual of assets held by a foreign company the individual controls, can therefore be completed by a transfer from the foreign holder to the declarant's Turkish account without breaking the rule. The flexibility is procedural, not evidential: in any later examination opened for other reasons, the declarant must still be able to show that the assets belonged to the person in whose name they were declared, and the transfer record from a third party is part of that proof rather than a substitute for it. Practice may vary by authority and year, and the bank's documentation of a third-party transfer should be retained for the full examination limitation period.
Unrecorded Assets Already in Turkey
A lawyer in Turkey explains the second limb of the amnesty, which concerns assets that are already in Turkey but have never been entered in the taxpayer's books. Under Article 6(1) of the Communiqué, income and corporate taxpayers may declare money, gold, foreign currency, securities and other capital market instruments that are in Turkey but absent from their statutory books, by 31 July 2027, using the same Annex 1 form and the same channel, that is, a bank or, for securities and capital market instruments, an intermediary institution. No separate declaration or filing is made to the tax office; the bank's Annex 3 return is the only communication with the administration. The Communiqué's Example 5 describes a company whose bank accounts hold 15,000,000 lira of foreign currency that belongs to the company but has never been recorded in its books; that currency may be declared through the bank and, subject to the other conditions, the amnesty applies to it.
A Turkish Law Firm sets out the condition specific to persons without books, because it is easy to miss. Under Article 6(2), a person with no income or corporate tax liability, a taxpayer not required to keep books, or an income taxpayer declaring personal assets outside the business, may declare domestic assets only if those assets are deposited into a bank or intermediary account by the date of declaration and the deposit is proved by documents. The declaration and the deposit therefore coincide for this group: the asset must be in the account when the form is filed. The rate rules, the Annex 2 commitment, the ten-day conversion window counted from the date of declaration, and the bank's collection and return apply to domestic declarations in the same way as to foreign ones, under Article 7.
An Istanbul Law Firm connects the domestic limb to the bookkeeping rules, because for a company this is where the real work lies. A taxpayer that keeps books must record the declared domestic assets at their lira value on the date of declaration, determined under the valuation rules of the Communiqué, and that recorded value becomes the cost basis for any later disposal. A taxpayer on the balance-sheet method must open a special fund account on the liability side for the recorded assets, with the restrictions described in the next section. The declared assets enter the business without being counted in the period's taxable income, and after two years from the date of declaration they may be withdrawn from the business without being counted in taxable income or, for a company, in distributable profit. A company that declares unrecorded cash or currency should therefore plan the accounting entries at the same time as the bank filing, because both must be dated to the declaration. Practice may vary by authority and year, and the accounting treatment should be settled with the company's auditor before the form is filed.
Valuation, Bookkeeping, and the Special Fund Account
An English speaking lawyer in Turkey sets out the valuation rules in Article 9 of the Communiqué, because the declared value fixes both the tax and the audit protection. Assets are valued on the date of declaration and declared at their Turkish lira equivalent. Lira is taken at nominal value and gold at its market value. Foreign currency is converted at the Central Bank of the Republic of Turkey's buying rate on the declaration date. Shares, bonds, bills, eurobonds and derivatives are taken at their stock exchange value where one exists, failing that at market value, failing that at acquisition cost, and failing that at nominal value; the exchange may be a Turkish or a foreign exchange, whichever is where the instrument traded on the declaration date. Investment fund units are taken at the closing price set in their market. The Communiqué defines market value as the actual trading value on the declaration date and requires it to reflect the true position. Where a declaration is corrected before the deadline, the values on the original declaration date are retained; later movements in exchange rates or prices do not re-open the valuation. Where declared assets are converted into a committed instrument, the value on the conversion date is used to track the commitment.
A Turkish Law Firm then describes the bookkeeping obligations in Article 10, which apply to every declarant that keeps books under the Tax Procedure Law. The declared assets must be recorded in the statutory books; where the declaration was made in a company's name, the company records them. A taxpayer on the balance-sheet method opens a special fund account on the liability side for the recorded assets. That fund is treated as part of capital, may not be withdrawn from the business for two years from the date of declaration, and may not be used for any purpose other than a capital increase. It is not taxed if the business is liquidated, and it is not taxed in a merger or division carried out under Article 81 of the Income Tax Law or Articles 19 and 20 of the Corporate Tax Law. A taxpayer on the simple or professional-income method shows the declared assets separately in its books. After the two-year period the assets may be withdrawn without affecting taxable or distributable income; before it, withdrawal of the assets or the fund puts the audit protection at risk.
A lawyer in Turkey completes the picture with Article 11, which governs gains and losses after the declaration. A loss realised on the later disposal of declared assets is not deductible in computing income or corporate tax; a gain is taxable under the general rules, with the recorded value as the cost basis for domestic assets. The tax paid under the amnesty itself is never deductible and never creditable. For a client comparing the amnesty with other routes to regularising foreign wealth, these are the hidden costs that sit beside the headline rate: a sealed loss position on the declared assets, a two-year lock on the fund, and a non-recoverable tax. In most cases they are outweighed by the protection the declaration buys, but they belong in the calculation. Practice may vary by authority and year, and the accounting entries should be reviewed with the client's auditor against the current Communiqué.
The Audit Protection and Its Limits
An Istanbul Law Firm states the protection precisely, because it is the reason to declare and it is narrower than clients tend to assume. Under Article 12(1) of the Communiqué, no tax examination and no tax assessment is made in respect of the amounts corresponding to the declared assets, provided the conditions are met. For foreign assets those conditions are: transfer to Turkey or to a Turkish bank or intermediary account within two months of declaration; timely payment of the tax assessed on the declared assets and compliance with any commitment given; and, for book-keeping taxpayers, recording of the assets, the opening of the special fund account or the separate showing in the books, no withdrawal of the fund or the assets for two years, and no use of the fund other than for a capital increase. For domestic assets the conditions are the recording, fund and two-year requirements, proof of deposit for non-taxpayers, timely payment and compliance with any commitment. The protection is not a general immunity from examination; it protects the declared amount and nothing else.
A Turkish Law Firm explains how the protection operates when an examination is opened for an unrelated reason, because the Communiqué's two examples on this point are the most instructive in the document. Under Article 12(2), where an examination or a referral to the appraisal commission started for reasons other than the declaration produces a base difference, and the difference is shown to arise from the declared assets, no income, corporate or value added tax is assessed if the declared amount equals or exceeds the difference. Example 6 describes a company that declared 10,000,000 lira of unrecorded domestic assets on 15 June 2026 and was later examined for 2024 as part of a sector review; the examination found 5,000,000 lira of unrecorded sales, the company showed that the difference arose from the declared assets, the examiner accepted that explanation, and no assessment was made. Where the difference exceeds the declared amount, only the excess is assessed. Example 7 describes a company that declared 50,000,000 lira of foreign assets and was examined for 2023 following a tip-off; the examination found a base difference of 75,000,000 lira, the company said 50,000,000 of it arose from the declared assets, the examiner found that only 40,000,000 did and that the remainder came from depreciation errors and miscalculated deductions and exemptions, and no assessment was made on the 40,000,000 while the remaining 35,000,000 was assessed.
An English speaking lawyer in Turkey draws the two lessons from those examples. First, the connection between the declared assets and the base difference must be real and demonstrable; a large declaration does not automatically shelter unrelated adjustments, and the examiner decides how much of a difference is attributable to the declared assets on the evidence. Second, timing is decisive. Under Article 12(3), a declaration made after an examination has begun or after a referral to the appraisal commission gives no protection against the differences that examination finds, and the declared amount cannot be set off against them. The Communiqué is careful to add that the tax office or an examiner merely having become aware of a matter does not bar a declaration: so long as the declaration is made before the examination formally begins or the referral is made, and the other conditions are met, the protection applies. For a client who suspects that an enquiry may be coming, the date of declaration against the date of formal commencement is the single most important fact, and a declaration filed the week before an examination opens is protected while one filed the week after is not. Practice may vary by authority and year, and the status of any open enquiry should be established before the declaration is filed.
Breaking the Conditions: What Is Lost and What Is Not Charged
A lawyer in Turkey is exact about the consequences of a failed condition, because the Communiqué separates two things that clients usually conflate: the loss of the audit protection and the recovery of the tax. Under Article 12(4), where declared foreign assets are not transferred to Turkey within two months, where the tax is not paid in time, where a commitment is broken, or where any other condition of Article 12 is not met, the declarant loses the protection against examination and assessment in respect of the declared assets. The Communiqué's Example 8 describes a company that declared 30,000,000 lira of foreign assets with a four-year time deposit commitment at the one per cent rate, and was found to have broken the deposit condition after two years; the commitment was breached, and the company can no longer rely on the protection. That is the principal sanction, and it is severe, because it reopens the declared amount to examination.
A Turkish Law Firm then explains the tax consequence, which is more measured than the loss of protection. Under Article 12(5), where a commitment is broken, the bank or intermediary holding the assets determines the tax that was not collected because of the reduced rate, by reference to the declared amount, withholds that tax together with default interest, and pays it to the tax office by the fifteenth of the month following collection. Under Article 12(6), where the assets were never transferred or deposited, the bank reports the failure and the tax office claims the tax not collected because of the commitment, together with default interest. In both cases the Communiqué states expressly that no tax loss penalty is applied to the tax that was not assessed in time. The declarant therefore pays the difference between the reduced rate and the five per cent default rate, plus interest, but not the penalty that would ordinarily attach to under-assessed tax. The absence of a penalty does not restore the protection; the two consequences run independently.
An Istanbul Law Firm lists the failures that most often cause this outcome, because each is avoidable. Declaring before the Turkish banking arrangements are in place, so that the two-month transfer or the ten-day conversion is missed. Declaring physical gold or cash and then carrying it into Turkey without the bank's certified copy of the Annex 1 form, so that customs cannot process it as an amnesty import. Choosing a commitment period that does not match the client's real liquidity horizon, so that the deposit is broken early and the protection is lost for a saving that was small to begin with. Withdrawing the special fund or the assets from a company within two years. And paying the bank's collection late. The Communiqué's structure rewards a declarant who treats the filing as the start of a two-year compliance programme rather than a single event, and a client should be clear before filing that every downstream condition can be met. Practice may vary by authority and year, and the consequences of a specific breach should be confirmed against Article 12 before any corrective step is taken.
How the Amnesty Interacts With the 20-Year Income Exemption
A Turkish Law Firm advising a client who is relocating to Turkey reads the wealth amnesty together with the twenty-year foreign income exemption, because the same Law No. 7582 created both and they are designed for overlapping populations. The income exemption, under Mükerrer Article 20/D of the Income Tax Law, relieves a new Turkish tax resident of income tax on foreign-source income for twenty years, subject to a clean three-calendar-year history and to obtaining an Exemption Certificate from the tax office within the deadline set by Communiqué No. 333. The wealth amnesty, under Provisional Article 19 of the Corporate Tax Law and General Communiqué No. 1, regularises existing foreign or unrecorded domestic assets for a defined payment. One addresses future income; the other addresses the existing stock of wealth. A relocating client typically has both, and a coordinated plan addresses both rather than treating them as unrelated.
An English speaking lawyer in Turkey draws the practical connections. The two regimes are independent in law: a declaration under the amnesty is not a condition of the income exemption, and the exemption does not require that foreign wealth be declared or brought to Turkey. But they interact in planning. A client who brings foreign assets into a Turkish bank under the amnesty and then earns interest or dividends on them in Turkey is earning Turkish-source income, which the income exemption does not cover; a client who keeps the assets abroad and earns the income there is earning foreign-source income, which the exemption does cover. The amnesty's committed instruments, time deposits, government securities, lease certificates and venture capital funds, are Turkish instruments, and their yield is Turkish-source. A client should therefore decide which assets to bring under the amnesty and which to leave abroad under the exemption with that distinction in view, rather than assuming that everything should come to Turkey.
An Istanbul Law Firm also sequences the two filings. The amnesty declaration goes to a bank and must be followed by a transfer within two months and, where a commitment is given, by conversion within ten days of transfer; the Exemption Certificate application goes to the tax office and must be made by the end of the calendar year of residency, or by the end of the following February for November and December arrivals. The two deadlines run on different clocks from different trigger dates, and a client arriving late in a calendar year can find both falling due within weeks of each other. In our practice we calendar both from the outset, and we keep the bank file and the tax office file separate, because the bank asks for no documents on the declared assets while the tax office checks residency, the look-back years and the timing of the certificate application. Practice may vary by authority and year, and the interaction should be planned with both Communiqués in view.
How a Turkish Law Firm Approaches a Wealth Amnesty Engagement
A lawyer in Turkey structures the engagement around the Communiqué's conditions, in the order they fall due. The first step is to establish what the client holds, where, in whose name, and in what form, because the asset categories are closed, real estate requires conversion before the deadline, and assets held through representatives or foreign companies have their own ownership-proof requirements under Article 8. The second step is to decide who declares, the individual or a company, and to assemble the ownership evidence for any asset held in a different name. The third step is to establish whether any examination has begun or any referral to the appraisal commission has been made, because a declaration after that point protects nothing. The fourth step is to design the commitment, if any, around the client's real liquidity horizon, so that a reduced rate is not bought at the price of a later breach.
An Istanbul Law Firm then manages the filing as a sequence of dated obligations. The Turkish bank account and, where a commitment is given, the committed instrument are arranged before the Annex 1 form is filed, so that the two-month transfer and the ten-day conversion can be met without pressure. The Annex 2 commitment is prepared with the declaration. For assets to be carried in physically, the bank's certified copy of the declaration is obtained before travel and the deposit is made by the end of the business day after customs. For a company, the accounting entries and the special fund account are dated to the declaration and the two-year lock is diarised. The bank's collection and return are confirmed, and the complete file, including the certified Annex 1, the receipts, the transfer records and any customs documents, is retained for the full examination limitation period, because the audit protection is proved by that file.
A Turkish Law Firm closes by situating the amnesty within the firm's wider cross-border practice, because for most clients it arrives as one part of a larger move. A client using the amnesty is often also relocating, establishing tax residence, claiming the twenty-year foreign income exemption, buying a Turkish home, or restructuring a business, sometimes through participation in the Istanbul Finance Center, and the amnesty is the component that regularizes existing wealth within that larger plan. The value of integrated counsel is that the asset declaration, the residence and income planning, the property work, and the source-country coordination are designed to fit together, with the deadlines and conditions of each respected. That is the case for instructing a firm that can see the whole relocation rather than a single instrument within it. Practice may vary by authority and year, and every element of the plan should be confirmed against the statute, General Communiqué No. 1, and current banking practice.
Author: Mirkan Topcu is an attorney registered with the Istanbul Bar Association (Istanbul 1st Bar), Bar Registration No: 67874. His practice focuses on cross-border and high-stakes matters where evidence discipline, procedural accuracy, and risk control are decisive, with particular concentration on the 2026 wealth amnesty under Provisional Article 19 of the Corporate Tax Law as implemented by General Communiqué No. 1, the Annex 1 bank declaration and Annex 2 commitment, the two-month repatriation and ten-day conversion rules, the ownership-proof requirements for assets held through representatives and foreign companies, the valuation and special fund account rules, the conditions and limits of the audit protection, and the coordination of the amnesty with the twenty-year foreign income exemption.
He advises individuals and companies across Immigration and Residency, Real Estate Law, Tax Law, Istanbul Finance Center participation, and cross-border documentation matters where procedural accuracy and evidence discipline are decisive. His practice spans Commercial and Corporate Law, Commercial Contracts, Foreign Investment, Data Protection and Privacy, Intellectual Property, Arbitration and Dispute Resolution, Enforcement and Insolvency, Citizenship and Immigration, Real Estate, International Tax, International Trade, Foreigners Law, Sports Law, Health Law, and Criminal Law.
Education: Istanbul University Faculty of Law (2018); Galatasaray University, LL.M. (2022). LinkedIn: Profile. Istanbul Bar Association: Official website.
Frequently Asked Questions
- What is the Turkey wealth amnesty 2026 and where is it found in law? It is the regime known as Varlık Barışı, created by Provisional Article 19 of the Corporate Tax Law (Law No. 5520), inserted by Law No. 7582 published on 4 June 2026, and implemented by the General Communiqué on Bringing Certain Assets into the Economy (Series No. 1) published on 4 July 2026 in the Official Gazette No. 33300. It allows individuals and companies to declare qualifying assets held abroad or unrecorded in Turkey, pay a defined rate, and obtain protection against tax examination and assessment on the declared amounts.
- Which assets can be declared? Money, gold, foreign currency, securities, and other capital market instruments. Real estate is outside the scope. Under Article 5(4) of the Communiqué, an out-of-scope foreign asset such as a property may be sold before 31 July 2027 and the proceeds declared as an in-scope asset.
- Where is the declaration made, and is a form required? To a Turkish bank, or to an intermediary institution for securities and capital market instruments only, on the Annex 1 form in two copies. The bank certifies one copy and returns it with the receipt. No declaration is made to the tax office directly, and under Article 4(3) the bank requests no documents about the declared assets.
- What is the deadline? Declarations may be made from 4 June 2026 until 31 July 2027 inclusive. The President may extend the period in further periods of up to one year in total. No correction to any declaration is possible after the period ends.
- What rate applies and how is it reduced? Five per cent of the declared value, collected by the bank at declaration. With an Annex 2 commitment to hold the assets in time deposits or participation accounts, government domestic debt securities or lease certificates, or venture capital funds, the rate is four per cent for one year, three for two, two for three, one for four, and zero for five years. Declarations from 1 January 2027 carry an extra half point; any extension period carries an extra full point.
- When does the commitment period start, and how quickly must the assets be converted? The period runs from the date the assets are placed in the committed instrument, not from the declaration. Under Article 9(7), declared assets must be converted into the committed instrument within ten days of transfer or deposit for foreign assets, and within ten days of declaration for domestic assets.
- How long do I have to bring foreign assets to Turkey? Two months from the date of each declaration, by transfer to an existing or new account at a Turkish bank or intermediary. Assets carried in physically must clear customs within that window and be deposited by the end of the first business day after customs, and customs will ask for the bank's certified copy of the declaration at entry.
- Can someone else transfer the assets on my behalf? Yes. Under Article 5(3), the person transferring from abroad and the declarant or Turkish account holder may be different persons without affecting the amnesty. The declarant must still be able to prove ownership if an unrelated examination is later opened.
- Can a company declare assets held in a shareholder's or representative's name? Yes. Under Article 8, assets belonging to a company or its shareholders but held abroad by legal representatives, shareholders, or persons authorised under a power of attorney executed before 4 June 2026, or by third parties, may be declared in the company's name. Assets belonging to an individual but held by a foreign company the individual controls may be declared in the individual's name. Ownership must be provable in any later unrelated examination.
- Can I change a declaration after filing? Within the same month, by correcting the original declaration, with a refund of tax on any reduction. In a later month, a reduction is possible only within the two-month transfer window and only before the assets are transferred or deposited; an increase is made by a new declaration for the additional amount only. Nothing can be corrected after 31 July 2027.
- What happens to the assets in a company's books? A book-keeping taxpayer records the declared assets at their declaration-date value. A balance-sheet taxpayer opens a special fund account on the liability side, which is treated as part of capital, cannot be withdrawn for two years from the declaration, and may be used only for a capital increase. After two years the assets may be withdrawn without affecting taxable or distributable income. Losses on later disposal are not deductible, and the amnesty tax itself is neither deductible nor creditable.
- What exactly does the audit protection cover? No tax examination or assessment is made in respect of the declared amounts, provided the transfer, payment, commitment, recording and two-year conditions are met. Where an examination opened for other reasons finds a base difference that is shown to arise from the declared assets, no income, corporate or VAT assessment is made up to the declared amount; only any excess is assessed. The protection does not cover differences that cannot be connected to the declared assets.
- Can I declare after a tax examination has started? A declaration made after an examination has formally begun or after a referral to the appraisal commission gives no protection against the differences that examination finds. The tax office merely having become aware of a matter does not bar a declaration; what matters is that the declaration precedes the formal start.
- What if I break the commitment or fail to transfer in time? The audit protection is lost for the declared assets. The bank withholds the difference between the reduced rate and five per cent with default interest, or the tax office claims it with interest where the assets were never transferred. No tax loss penalty is applied to that tax under Articles 12(5) and 12(6) of the Communiqué, but the protection does not revive.
- How does ER&GUN&ER Law Firm assist with a wealth amnesty declaration? We map the client's holdings against the five asset categories and the ownership rules of Article 8, confirm that no examination has begun, design the commitment around the client's real liquidity horizon, arrange the Turkish bank account and committed instrument before the Annex 1 filing, prepare the Annex 2 commitment, sequence the two-month transfer and ten-day conversion, coordinate physical imports with customs, settle the accounting entries and special fund account with the client's auditor, and retain the complete evidential file. We coordinate the declaration with the client's residency, the twenty-year income exemption and its Exemption Certificate deadline, and the client's wider relocation plan.