According to a recent amendment to the Hungarian Act on Sport in March 2019, an international sport association – recognized by the International Olympic Committee – will be classified and regulated as a subtype of sport associations in Hungary.

The Hungarian Public Procurement Act was modified as of 18 April 2019, in order to comply with the provisions of the Directive 2014/55/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of on electronic invoicing in public procurement.

On 1 April 2019 the Hungarian Parliament adopted a new act on the amendments necessary for the implementation of the European Union’s data protection reform (“Data Protection Reform Act”). The new act has a comprehensive nature, as it aims to finalise the implantation of the data protection reform in the affected (more than 80) sectoral laws.

In March 2019 the Hungarian Parliament voted to introduce a new form of asset management foundation, which will serve as a real alternative to the fiduciary asset management (trust) system (“bizalmi vagyonkezelés” in Hungarian).

„Hungary opposes the introduction of the common corporate income tax base, or a new type of VAT in the European Union, and insists on keeping its competitive tax system” said Hungarian Minister of Finance Mihály Varga in Bucharest at an informal meeting of the European Union’s Financial Ministers on 5 April 2019.

More than a thousand companies have decided to perform the corporate income tax as a member of a so-called corporate taxpayer group, which may result in a total savings of HUF 15 billion for the companies. One of the greatest advantages of the corporate taxpayer groups is the offsetting of positive and negative tax bases, better use of tax incentives, and the non-applicability of transfer pricing rules.

The main amendments to the act on the spatial plan (“területrendezési terv” in Hungarian) of Hungary and certain high priority regions (Spatial Planning Act) entered into force on 15 March 2019 aiming at the reform of spatial planning. The Spatial Planning Act rules and revises the national spatial plan, as well as the spatial plans of the agglomeration of Budapest and the Lake Balaton High Priority Holiday Zone which areas had been regulated in separate acts earlier.

On 13 February 2019 the European Parliament and Council agreed on how the EU’s copyright rules should be updated aiming to strengthen the position of the journalists and artists vis-á-vis the large online platforms.  According to the agreement, the big online platforms should no longer be able to earn money by using journalists’ and artists’ content without paying them. Crucially, start-ups and smaller online platforms (under 10 million global turnover or not more than 5 million unique monthly visitors) will be subject to less strict obligations than well-known large companies like Facebook or YouTube.

In principle, in the course of the land registry procedure, the position of an entry of record in the land registry, and the order of such records is determined by the filing date of the applications or requests. Under the Hungarian Land Registry Act, the order of the entries may be modified on the basis of an authentic instrument signed by all parties, a private document countersigned by an attorney or bar association legal counsel, or on the basis of a private document where the signatures of the parties are attested by a notary public.

In the absence of an agreement between the EEA and the UK (no-deal Brexit), the UK becomes a „third country” as of 00.00 am CET on 30 March 2019. This means that the organisations should revise those of their processing activities, which imply transfer of personal data to the UK.

According to the announcement of the state secretary for tax matters issued in February 2019, the Hungarian Ministry of Finance is planning to introduce a new system that prevents multinational companies to avoid tax burdens in Hungary.

The Hungarian Government submitted a bill to the Hungarian Parliament in February 2019. The goal of the new legislation is to amend more than 80 acts in order to comply with the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). According to experts, these amendments could bring an easier and more uniform application of the data protection laws.

On 13 February 2019 the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) delivered a ruling in a Hungarian case concerning the application of the provisions on VAT. According to the VAT Directive, as a general rule, VAT is be payable by the person carrying out the taxable supply of goods or services. However, in specific cases the Member States may deviate from this provision and provide that the person liable for payment of VAT is the taxable person to whom the supplies are made.

In order to create an integrated system for high volume public construction investments, the Hungarian Government has adopted a new legislation. From January 2019, high volume public construction investments reaching the estimated value of HUF 700 million must be executed by a state-owned company, i.e. the Investment Agency.

According to the official communications, the Hungarian Government is determined to make steps towards the simplification of the public administration while increasing its quality.

One of the most significant limitations of the national economic capacity is labour shortages, namely the lack of professionals, skilled and experienced workforce. In order to recruit the best qualified candidates, companies shall develop ways to become attracting.

In early 2017 the Hungarian Parliament passed the Code of Administrative Litigation as a beginning of the reform of the central administration. As the final step, the Hungarian Parliament adopted a law on the Administrative Courts on 12 December 2018. The goal of the new legislation was to ’restore the prestige of the administrative courts’ which was abolished in 1949. Since then no separate administrative court system existed, it was integrated into the civil courts.

The amendments of the Act on the Transactions in Agricultural and Forestry Land (Land Act) entered into force on 11 January 2019. Based on the new rules, in the approval procedure of the sale and purchase agreement for agricultural lands, the regional entity of the Hungarian Chamber of Agriculture as local land committee will prepare an opinion whether the sale and purchase agreement is in compliance with the aspects included in the Land Act (e.g. transparency of the relationship of tenures, preventing speculative land acquisition). The amendment determines the conditions that shall be considered in the course of the assessment of the compliance with these aspects, such as the purchase price of the land, the lands already owned by the purchaser, or how the sale and purchase of the land serves the acquisition of ownership of young farmers or new agricultural producers.