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The Portuguese Law ⚖️

Mar 28, 2024

ARTICLE PUBLISHED IN THE TRIBUNA PORTUGUESA NEWSPAPER

It has been an honor to work with a community strongly rooted in the United States that maintains an emotional connection with Portugal, expressed in the most diverse ways, transforming the distance that separates us into unity.

I have had the opportunity to establish a legal bridge between these two great countries, where Portugueseness is felt in such a genuine way, which has given Portuguese law another perspective and dynamic, at least in the way I interpret it.

The expressiveness of this dichotomy can be seen in the way in which deep respect is shown for the legal systems of both countries. This duality is not always easy to manage for those who live permanently in the United States and have property interests in Portugal.

This will be the case for those who have dissolved their marriage in the United States but are still married under Portuguese law, since they will have to apply to the court in Portugal for a review of the foreign divorce judgment, since the divorce was formulated and decreed by a judgment issued by a judicial body in the United States, they will have to file a new action for review and confirmation of the judgment of the foreign judgment that decreed the divorce between the couple, with the competent Court of Appeal and request confirmation of that judgment, the effects of which go back to the date it was handed down. These effects are of great importance when property rights that have been acquired in the meantime are at stake.

I realize that not everyone is aware of the importance of the Convention and the Protocol that Portugal and the United States of America have signed with a view to avoiding double taxation and preventing tax evasion in the field of income tax, which is aimed at residents of one or both of the Contracting States and applies to personal income tax, corporate income tax and the municipal surcharge.

The Convention lays down the rules for those who earn income in one of the Contracting States but are resident in another, as is the case with capital gains tax, i.e. gains that a resident of a Contracting State receives from the sale of real estate located in the other Contracting State may be taxed in that other State.

The Convention goes even further by regulating income from pensions, annuities, alimony and child maintenance, public remuneration, and safeguards the prohibition of double taxation, more burdensome taxation (non-discrimination) and tax evasion, but this is a topic and others that we will develop in our next article.

Judith Teodoro,

Lawyer