Relocating to Bulgaria or move business after Brexit

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Relocating to Bulgaria after Brexit is an option considered by more and more Britons. Moving business to Bulgaria is another option which more and more European and worldwide businessmen are taking advantage of.

Bulgaria is an EU member since 2007. Continued financial stability, lowest corporate income tax in Europe (10%), lowest cost of labour force combined with highly educated work force are only a few of its credits. That is why it is not a surprise why UK and other EU companies already started to study the opportunities to use Bulgaria as a safe harbour for relocation of their business.

The EU is the UK’s largest trade partner. Free movement of goods within the EU is one of its best achievements – no border control, no duties, no VAT payable on import. Brexit puts too much uncertainty about how UK export-import companies will be affected. Some are optimistic that new trading arrangements will be achieved allowing Britain to continue to benefit from free trade even after Brexit but largest European member states already implied that such scenario is unlikely to happen. That means that UK trading companies and manufacturers could face significant difficulties and it may happen that they will not be able to run their European businesses from the UK. Relocating to Bulgaria a working business is not an easy job, that is why most businessmen prefer to wait and monitor the consequence of events before making a decision. Waiting is not a wise option as any last minute relocation could result in negative due diligence reports and decline in reputation; some top corporate UK solicitors and consultants already advised that relocating to the EU should be considered in the wake of Brexit as moving will allow such companies to get round potential trade barriers.

Most uncertain is the statute of regulated companies, such as financial institutions, transport companies, investment brokers, etc. Now most global regulated companies do business in the EU through their UK based companies using the right to passport their service in other member states. For example, largest Forex brokers are UK based and London is the largest Forex trading hub in Europe. According to statistics over 40 % of foreign exchange trading volumes worldwide are generated in London. Large market makers will definitely relocate to other big financial centres such as Frankfurt, Dublin or Paris but for a medium Forex broker Bulgaria is the perfect relocation option. A number of new emerging brokers already chose Bulgaria for their licensing even before Brexit mainly due to the low cost of the initial investment for the licensing and low cost of the post-licence support. Bulgaria also offers perfect conditions for haulage companies licensing as well. Procedures are fast and insurance and guarantee are much cheaper as compared to the UK. Now UK transport companies use one licence of the Community which allows them to carry cargo across the EU. The negative impact of Brexit is expected to be most severe for trucking companies, not only because of the EU regulations but due to the fact that 80 % of the truck drivers in the UK are immigrants and shortage of workforce is forecasted as inevitable, if not now, surely in a few months or years.

Bulgaria is still not among the top relocation jurisdictions for big corporations but its advantages for small and medium sized businesses are unquestionable and perspicacious entrepreneurs have already noticed the chance to insure their business future by setting up a Bulgarian company. Having companies in both the UK and Bulgaria is a wise business decision for many reasons, the main of which is the fact that the initial company setup is very cheap and then running a dormant company costs a couple of hundred euros per annum. A Bulgarian dormant company can be quickly turned into an active commercial company at any time if its owner(s) decide to start doing business in Bulgaria – and this would then be a company with business history, although it has been dormant for that time. Some have already moved their whole businesses in Bulgaria while some have only cloned their businesses – moving only 10-20% of their business activities just to see how well they will perform while keeping their main business activities in the UK. In any case setting up a Bulgarian company is definitely beneficial to British businessmen, no matter what exactly the business consequences of Brexit will be.

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