An operating split exists when there is both a material and a human connection between a holding company and an operating company. The often serious tax consequence is that a dissolution of these interconnections is regularly associated with significant tax payments. A special form of “normal” is the co-entrepreneurial division, in which ownership and operating companies are partnerships. The joint entrepreneurial division of operations is regularly (even) harder to recognize, but can have similarly serious consequences.

- to a corporation over which it can exercise a dominant influence (participation greater than 50%, activity as managing director, etc.)

leaves. From the point of view of the receiving corporation, the assets must be “essential operating bases”, i.e. essential for the survival of the company. The BFH has decided, for example, that buildings, patents and vehicle fleets in particular are among the essential operating bases as a material group. In individual cases, however, a proof (counter-proof) contradicting this assumption is always possible.

The provision of the essential operating basis leads to a material, the decisive participation in the company to a human connection. If both conditions are common, the division of operations arises.

Unlike the joint entrepreneurial division, the transferred assets are in the “classical” division in the private assets of the taxpayer. In the case of real estate, for example, this has the purpose of selling it tax-free after 10 years (§ 23 (1) no. 1 EStG). If the property were purchased directly into the operating assets of the GmbH, costs would be the same amount, but the advantage of a tax-free sale option would be lost.

Unfortunately, the company split makes this project a line through the calculation. Because it leads to the emergence of a so-called ownership company on a private level. Since the corporation also operates commercially, it is a sole proprietorship within the meaning of § 15 EStG. Both