At the beginning of 2022, Law No. 21,420 was enacted to establish the Universal Guaranteed Pension (PGU) and its sources of financing. Among the latter, a single tax of 10% (IU) was included on capital gains obtained from the sale of shares of open stock companies, as well as other public offering instruments regulated in article 107 of the Law on Income Tax (LIR). 

As of said modification, through Circular No. 39 of 2022, the Chilean Internal Revenue Service (SII) interpreted it as an obligation for first category taxpayers to carry out PMPs (provisional monthly payments, PPM for its initials in Spanish) with respect to the gross income obtained from the indicated operations. 

This interpretation has been criticized, mainly for two reasons. The first one consists of the violation of the principle of legality, by imposing taxpayers to pay PMPs on this type of income without being a legal norm that establishes said obligation. The second consists of subjecting these incomes to provisional payments designed to cover a first category tax of 27 or 25% and not a single tax of 10%, resulting in an excess payment that will normally lead to a request for a tax refund, making tax compliance more cumbersome and burdening the tasks of the IRS. 

Considering these, the IRS presented a project to modify Circular 39 of 2022, by means of which nullifies the obligation to carry out PMPs on the gross income derived from the operations regulated in article 107 of the LIR. 

The consultation process of the aforementioned draft circular ended on June 12, so we will soon be able to know the definitive instructions on the matter. Everything indicates will be in line with those contained in the draft.