Tax Updates

Minister Eelco Heinen of Finance announced on 25 February 2026 that he will revise the Box 3 bill. He is going back to the drawing board. The Financieele Dagblad reported this on Wednesday morning.

The trigger was twofold: a wave of investor protests and critical remarks from the Senate at the start of its review process. The combination appears to have convinced Heinen that the current bill is politically unsustainable in the Senate.

Heinen warns that reform of the tax on investment returns remains necessary, and that no additional budget is available for changes that would reduce revenue.

Source: Financieele Dagblad, 25 February 2026

The bill as passed by the Lower House on 12 February 2026 is no longer the end point. A revised version is coming. That version must go back through the legislative process, which means:

The Finance Committee (FIN) of the Eerste Kamer (Senate) met on 24 February 2026 to discuss the procedure for reviewing bill 36.748. The outcome was a concrete first step: the Ministry of Finance has been asked to hold a technical briefing on 17 March 2026.

Source: eerstekamer.nl

A technical briefing is a presentation by civil servants explaining the content of the bill. It is not a political debate, but an opportunity for senators to ask questions about how the law works in practice, including questions on enforceability, transitional rules, and the technical details of the wealth accretion tax.

After the briefing, the written preparation phase begins. Parliamentary groups submit written questions to the State Secretary, who responds via a Memorandum of Reply. This typically takes several weeks to a month.

After that comes the plenary debate in the Senate, and finally the vote. Based on the current timeline, the vote is expected in spring 2026. Media outlets including the Financieele Dagblad mention May as a possible target month, but this has not been officially confirmed.

Today, 24 February 2026, the Finance Committee (FIN) of the Eerste Kamer (Senate) discusses the procedure for reviewing bill 36.748, the Wet Werkelijk Rendement Box 3. This is the first formal step now that the bill has been referred from the Lower House.

Source: eerstekamer.nl

In the Senate, the review of any bill always starts with agreeing on the procedure. The committee decides how and when it wants to examine the bill: when is the deadline for written questions, does the committee want a hearing with external experts, and how long does the cabinet have to respond?

Only then do the substantive steps follow:

1. Written preparation: senators submit questions, the State Secretary responds via a Memorie van Antwoord (memorandum of reply)

Most countries tax capital gains only when an asset is sold, using the realisation basis. From 2028, the Netherlands takes the opposite approach for shares and investment funds: an annual levy on unrealised appreciation. That difference in timing creates a new problem for anyone holding foreign assets.

Say you own shares in an American company. The US taxes the gain only when you sell. The Netherlands taxes that same gain every year. There is no moment at which both countries are taxing the same income, because they use fundamentally different definitions of when a gain becomes taxable. The result can be double taxation on the same wealth, with no tax treaty offering a way out.

This was flagged by tax adviser Rutger van Esch (BDO Tax & Legal) in the February issue of Vakblad Estate Planning. His conclusion: the Netherlands is once again becoming an 'odd one out' internationally.

Many countries levy withholding tax on dividends paid to Dutch residents. Under the current system, you can credit that tax against your box 3 liability, but those rules change in 2028.

The cabinet wants to introduce a so-called 'second limit' for crediting foreign withholding taxes. This means the offset rules will be extended with a carry-forward mechanism, letting you roll over withholding tax you cannot credit in one year into subsequent years. The 'joint method', whereby income from multiple countries is combined to calculate the offset limit, also becomes relevant for box 3.

On 12 February 2026, a broad majority of the Dutch Lower House approved the Wet Werkelijk Rendement Box 3. This represents a significant step towards a fundamental overhaul of the wealth tax.

But the law is not yet final. Under the Dutch legislative process, the Eerste Kamer (Senate) must also give its approval. Until that happens, the law can still be rejected, amended, or postponed.

The Eerste Kamer (Senate) reviews legislation primarily for quality, enforceability, and constitutionality - not for political desirability. It is customary for the Senate to ask probing questions, especially on complex tax legislation.

In reviewing this bill, attention is expected to focus on:

On social media and at family dinners, you sometimes hear it stated as fact: the government has decided not to tax unrealised capital gains after all. "They're switching to a capital gains tax," people say. "Shares will only be taxed when you sell them."

That is incorrect. And this misunderstanding can lead to costly financial mistakes.

Below, we set out precisely what has been passed into law, what remains a political ambition, and why that ambition is far from certain.

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Two key terms are at the heart of this debate.

The Dutch Tax Authority (Belastingdienst) has published the definitive fictitious return percentages for tax year 2025 in box 3. These rates apply under the current interim system, which remains in place until the Wet Werkelijk Rendement takes effect on 1 January 2028.

Confirmed rates for 2025:

On 12 February 2026, a broad majority of the Dutch Lower House (Tweede Kamer) approved the Wet Werkelijk Rendement Box 3. This means that the current interim system - based on fictitious returns per asset category - will be replaced from 1 January 2028 by a system that taxes actual returns.

The new law introduces the following fundamental changes:

Following the Lower House approval on 12 February 2026, it has been confirmed that the Wet Werkelijk Rendement Box 3 will take effect on 1 January 2028, one year later than the originally planned date of 1 January 2027.

The delay gives taxpayers, implementing organisations, and financial institutions more time to prepare for the new system.

Importantly, the law has not yet been formally enacted. The Eerste Kamer (Senate) still needs to consider and approve the bill. Only after Senate approval will the law be formally adopted.

The Senate can:

In December 2021, the Dutch Supreme Court (Hoge Raad) made a landmark ruling: the Box 3 system violated the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). The system taxed taxpayers on the basis of a high fictitious return, while savers in reality earned far less due to low interest rates.

This led to a mass objection procedure and ultimately to legal redress for the years 2017–2022.

On 6 June 2024, the Supreme Court provided further clarity on the scope of legal redress. The central question was: does every taxpayer have the right to individual assessment, or only those who had filed a timely objection?

The Supreme Court ruled that taxpayers who can demonstrate that their actual return was lower than the fictitious return have a right to reassessment, even if the regular objection period had already expired.

This is a significant expansion of the group of taxpayers entitled to compensation.