Corporate tax, FATF status, sanctions exposure, data-protection law and arbitration enforceability for Ireland — the facts a founder or counsel checks before incorporating or signing cross-border. Jurisdiction table checked 2026-10-15.
A 12.5% trading rate, EU membership, English-language common law and a deep pool of people who have done this before are why so much software and pharma sits here. One correction to the old pitch: since 2024 large groups within scope of the OECD global minimum tax face a 15% effective floor, so the headline rate is now the answer only for smaller groups.
This describes how the jurisdiction is commonly used in practice — not a recommendation for your situation. What fits depends on where your people, customers and assets actually are.
Ireland's standard corporation tax rate is 12.5% on trading income, as Revenue states directly on its basis-of-charge page; 25% applies to non-trading income and to an excepted trade. Our entry showed 15%, which is the Pillar Two minimum effective rate that in-scope groups — consolidated turnover above EUR 750 million — are topped up to, not the rate Ireland charges a company. This field carries the standard rate and deliberately excludes surcharges, small-company rates and special regimes, so 15% belonged in the Pillar Two calculators and not here. The 12.5% headline itself has not moved since 2003; what changed is that we stopped conflating it with the top-up.
The headline corporate income tax rate in Ireland is 12.5%. Free zones, small-business reliefs and participation exemptions can change the effective rate — treat this as the starting point.
What is this? Corporate tax rate →Ireland is FATF-compliant and not on the grey list, which generally means smoother bank onboarding.
What is this? FATF status →Ireland is not subject to broad sectoral sanctions programs in our dataset.
What is this? Sanctions exposure →Ireland is an EU member state. The list covers third countries only, so a member state never appears in either annex.
The applicable data-protection statute is GDPR (in force since 2018). If you process EU/UK personal data you also need a valid transfer mechanism into Ireland.
What is this? Data-protection law →Ireland is a party to the 1958 New York Convention, so a foreign arbitral award can generally be enforced by local courts — the single most important box to tick before agreeing to arbitration with a counterparty here.
What is this? New York Convention →Ireland is a party to the 1961 Hague Apostille Convention. Public documents — corporate certificates, powers of attorney, notarised papers — need only a single apostille to be recognised in other member states, with no consular legalisation. This materially speeds up cross-border paperwork.
What is this? Apostille Convention (1961) →Foreigners may generally own 100% of a local company in Ireland.
What is this? Foreign ownership →Ireland requires a resident/local director. This adds real cost and a governance dependency — include it in the structure.
What is this? Local director requirement →The entity types actually used in cross-border practice, with the name each one carries in its own register.
Names are given as the register uses them and are deliberately not translated — a form is called what it is called. The list covers what is commonly used, not everything the statute allows, and availability to a foreign founder can depend on activity, licensing and residency.
Free, no sign-up, computed in your browser.
Lawyers, accountants, corporate and trust providers, real-estate agents, dealers in precious metals and casinos carry anti-money-laundering duties of their own. FATF rates how well a country's law meets three of its recommendations on them.
This rates the quality of the legislation, not whether you personally must run these checks, and not how the law is enforced in practice — FATF measures enforcement on a separate scale that is not in this dataset.
Reports from 2025 onwards use the 2022 methodology; everything earlier uses the 2013 one. Ratings from the two are not directly comparable, which is why the methodology is always shown.
forma. generates NDAs, service, supply and corporate documents wired to this jurisdiction — from lawyer-built templates, processed privately on your device.
About forma. →Ignito Advisory designs cross-border holdings, IP routing, banking onboarding and regulatory strategy — as paid work, after an NDA, a signed scope and a fixed fee. The first conversation is free: thirty minutes under NDA, ending in a written statement of the problem and a proposed scope.
Request a discovery call →Or book a call →Informational resource curated by the Ignito legal practice and cross-checked against primary sources. This is not legal advice and does not create a lawyer-client relationship. Rules change — verify against the primary source before you sign or file. Terms of Use · ← Back to the monitor