XJune 9, 2026
🇮🇹 Italy just tripled the price of its tax deal for wealthy new residents.
In 2017 a new resident could opt in for €100k a year, flat, on covered foreign-source income. From January 2026 the same deal costs €300,000.
And that may not be the deterrent it looks like.
Under Article 24-bis of the Italian tax code, a new resident owes no further Italian income tax on covered foreign-source income, however large, for up to 15 years. One carve-out matters: capital gains on qualified shareholdings sold in the first five years stay taxed at the standard 26 percent.
The sticker price is what moved. €100k in 2017. €200k in August 2024. €300k from January 2026. The family surcharge doubled to €50k per person.
Here is the part most headlines miss. The €300k tag deters. The question is who.
The break-even depends on how the income is taxed. Against Italy's top ordinary rate, past 45 percent once regional and municipal surtaxes load onto the 43 percent national band, €300k pays for itself around €670k of foreign income. Against the 26 percent on most financial income, closer to €1.15M. Below that you overpay. Above it the flat tax wins, and the effective rate keeps falling: 6 percent on €5M, 3 percent on €10M.
So the hike does not close the door. It raises the velvet rope. It prices out the merely affluent and keeps the regime aimed at genuine ultra-high-net-worth households, the ones who barely notice the jump from €100k to €300k. Less a deterrent than a filter.
Anyone already enrolled stays grandfathered at their original €100k or €200k rate. Italy raised the price without touching its existing base.
It is no longer the cheapest deal on paper, Greece runs a comparable lump sum at €100k a year with a €500k investment attached, but for large foreign incomes Italy stays one of Europe's most competitive options.
That is not a country retreating from tax competition. That is a country discovering its pricing power.
Smart price discrimination, or the first crack in a regime that ends the way the UK non-dom did?
#Italy #TaxOptimization