Royal Decree grants temporary extension for investment deduction certificate

Published


To ease the transition to the new ‘thematic’ investment deduction regime, the Belgian government has issued a Royal Decree dated 28 July 2025 (Dutch/French) introducing a temporary transitional (one-off) extension to the certificate application deadline, allowing taxpayers to safeguard their entitlement to the deduction.

Under the law of 12 May 2024, taxpayers must obtain a certificate for assets acquired or created from 1 January 2025 onwards, normally within three months after the financial year-end in order to benefit from the thematic investment deduction. The Decree now allows that for assets acquired or created between 1 January 2025 and 30 June 2026, the certificate may be requested within twelve months following the end of the taxable period. However, this twelve-month period can never extend beyond 30 June 2026, unless it would result in a shorter period than three months to request the certificate.

The Royal Decree also provides practical examples of how the extension applies across different accounting years. While the certificate should in principle be available before filing the corporate income tax return, the newly introduced Royal Decree allows it to be requested even after the tax return deadline. As this raises questions about the formalities to be followed, further guidance on the practical implementation is still expected.

For more details on the thematic investment deduction and the application of the necessary certificates, see also our newsflash of 16 January 2025 or contact Tim Pieters, Koen De Grave or your regular PwC contact.