The definition of a real beneficiary is found in the Act on counteracting money laundering and terrorist financing. Pursuant to the statutory explanation, the real beneficiary is a natural person or natural persons who exercise direct or indirect control over the client through their powers, which arise from legal or factual circumstances, enabling the exercise of decisive influence over the actions taken by the client or a natural person or natural persons on behalf of whom a business relationship is established or an occasional transaction is carried out. A natural person, for example, can be considered a sole proprietorship, partners in partnerships, natural persons being part-owners or shareholders of the client, or in control of them, or simply holding senior management positions. 

According to Polish income tax laws regulating, among others, the matter of transfer prices, related entities should be understood i.a as entities between which there is a bond of capital, personal, family or other nature specified by statute, provided that there is an actual mutual influence with each other. Related also entities include partnership and its partners, as well as the entity and its foreign plant.  

Thus, to show an example, two companies with the same shareholder or entities with the same person being a member of the management / supervisory board may be related entities.  

The main obligations incumbent on related entities include:  

1. obligation to apply the market price in transactions, 
2. obligation to prepare transfer pricing documentation together with comparability analysis.  

The obligation to comply with the market price means setting the price between related entities so that it would not be different than the one set by completely independent entities- in practice, in order to determine the market price comparability analysis should be carried out (basing on one’s own data or the ones available on the market).  

What comes next, transfer pricing documentation should be prepared if the transaction limits (PLN 2 million or PLN 10 million – depending on the type of transaction) are exceeded on a given transaction of a homogeneous nature, and also when a Polish taxpayer makes a purchase transaction with entities based in a tax haven. 

A simple joint-stock company is a new type of a private limited company. It was introduced pursuant to the Act of 19 July 2019 amending the Act – Code of Commercial Companies and certain other acts and was to come into force in legal trading from March 1, 2020. However, according to the Ministry of Development’s announcement, the starting date will probably be moved to March 1, 2021. A simple joint-stock company is a flexible and innovative form of doing business. It was designed as an opportunity for small and medium enterprises to grow, particularly for startups. 

A simple joint-stock company (PSA) is a separate form of a capital company combining both the features of a limited liability company and a joint-stock company, with the addition of unusual possibilities in the form of, amongst others, the permission to contribute to the company in the form of work or services. The main assumptions include the possibility of quick registration via an electronic system, the symbolic amount of the minimum share capital of 1 PLN, easy disposal of company funds, a simplified electronic register of shareholders, a flexible structure of bodies and a shortened liquidation procedure.

In accordance with art.  276 par. 1 and 463 par.  1 of the Code of Commercial Companies, the liquidators in relation to a limited liability company and a joint-stock company are members of the board, provided that the articles of association or resolution of the shareholders / the statute or the resolution of the general meeting provide otherwise. On the basis of the amendment to the Code of Commercial Companies and the addition of § 11 in art. 276 CCC and § 31 in art. 463 of the Commercial Companies Code, the way of representing of the company in liquidation is also clearly stated, so that in accordance with the new provisions, the representation of the company is to be specified in the company’s contract (statute), resolution of the shareholders (general meeting) or court ruling.