In December 2015 the Ministry of Finance issued a Decree implementing the Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development’s Common Reporting Standard (‘’CRS’’) and the Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement on the Automatic Exchange of Financial Account Information. 
The Decree, which took effect on 1 January 2016, sets out the framework for financial institutions operating in Cyprus to collect and review information from their customers and investors regarding tax residence, and to forward prescribed information to the national tax authorities for disclosure to relevant overseas tax authorities. 
The Decree sets out the main rules regarding client acceptance, due diligence and reporting, defines the scope of the CRS in terms of entities and products and sets out the reporting deadlines and penalties for any breach. 
Financial institutions are required to obtain the tax residence and tax identification number of all new customers. For existing individual account holders they may rely on the account holder’s recorded residential address for the purposes of determining tax residence and reporting status. The deadline for reporting information to the Cyprus tax authorities is 30 June of the year following the calendar year to which the information relates.