Save on trade tax with Trading GmbH

Many ambitious stock investors have long recognized the advantages of conducting securities and futures transactions through a limited liability company (GmbH). This is particularly true since a 2021 amendment to the law made trading financial products less attractive for private individuals from a tax perspective by limiting the loss carryforward limit to €20,000.

Those who take advantage of this situation to stock or futures trading through a trading GmbH can benefit from preferential tax treatment. For pure stock trading, the tax at the GmbH level is only around 1.5%, compared to the approximately 26.4% withholding tax, including the solidarity surcharge, on profits at the private level. However, if other types of securities transactions are also processed through the GmbH, the tax situation becomes more complex; for futures trading, for example, the corporate income tax and trade tax amount to approximately 30%.

A trading GmbH (or asset management GmbH or savings bank GmbH ) is subject to trade tax even if it exclusively conducts stock market transactions, such as trading stocks or bonds, as well as ETFs, options, derivatives, etc. Therefore, the registered office of the trading GmbH is a crucial cost factor, as it significantly determines the amount of trade tax payable. This amount can be calculated using our trade tax calculator for trading GmbHs . Relocating the registered office of a trading GmbH to a municipality with a low trade tax rate can thus have a lasting positive impact on the after-tax performance of its trading activities.