The Commissioner has appealed to the Federal Court against the AAT decision in Devuba Pty Limited v FC of T [2015] AATA 255.
In that case, the AAT held that the existence of a dividend access share arrangement did not affect the taxpayer’s right to CGT small business concessions on the capital gain arising from the sale of shares.
This was primarily because the rights attaching to the dividend access shares were varied such that they did not carry a right to dividends unless the directors resolved that they did. In effect, two steps were then required to pay a dividend on the dividend access shares. The first was for the directors to resolve that the dividend access shares carried a right to dividends. The second was for the directors to declare a dividend on those dividend access shares.