Transfer pricing and municipal fees: the new regime under GR (ARCA) 5903/2026 and the limit on outsourced audits

I. Transfer Pricing: General Resolution (ARCA) 5903/2026

1. General Resolution (ARCA) 5903/2026", published in Doctrina Tributaria ERREPAR (DTE) on 10/19/2026.

General Resolution 5903/2026 (Official Gazette of 09/30/2026) completely replaced ARCA's regulations on transfer pricing. The article analyzes its main updates and the points in which, in our opinion, it exceeds the law.

2. Practical Aspects of Interest

• When it applies. To fiscal years beginning on or after 10/1/2026. For companies with fiscal years ending on December 31, the first covered fiscal year is 2027.

• Higher and adjustable thresholds. For example, the Transfer Pricing Study will be required when covered transactions exceed $3,000 million in aggregate or $600 million individually. The amounts will be adjusted for inflation every year, starting with fiscal years beginning on or after 1/1/2028.

• New due dates and more information. The Study and Form 2668 are due in the seventh month following the fiscal year-end, and a 26-question risk questionnaire on international taxation must be submitted with Form 2668.

• Low value-adding intra-group services. An optional regime is introduced that bypasses the comparability analysis if the mark-up on costs is at least 5% (when the service is provided by the local company) or up to 5% (when provided by the foreign related party), although subject to additional requirements beyond those of the OECD.

• Commodity exports. For six products (soybean meal and pellets, soybean oil, sunflower oil, soybeans, corn, and bread wheat), the official FOB value serves as an optional reference in favor of the exporter.

  
  

We recommend that companies with transactions involving foreign related parties or international intermediaries review their documentation and pricing policies now for the first covered fiscal year.

II. Municipal taxes: the "Pepsico" case

The Supreme Court upheld a ruling from Río Negro that overturned the collection of advertising and promotional fees by the Municipality of San Carlos de Bariloche against Pepsico for the years 2016 through 2018. The reason: the tax debt was calculated based on surveys conducted by a private company hired by the municipality, rather than on inspections carried out by public officials. For companies, this serves as a concrete argument to challenge any municipal tax claim based on outsourced inspections.

3. The Case

The Municipality of San Carlos de Bariloche (Río Negro) claimed advertising and promotional fees from Pepsico de Argentina S.R.L. for the years 2016, 2017, and 2018. To calculate the debt, the municipality relied on surveys conducted by personnel from a private company hired to assist in the management of this tax.

Pepsico challenged the procedure. The Río Negro judiciary ruled in its favor at the court of first instance and the Court of Appeals, and the provincial Superior Court of Justice confirmed the nullity of the tax assessment notices. The municipality attempted to bring the case to the Supreme Court, but the extraordinary appeal was denied and the Supreme Court also dismissed the complaint appeal. Consequently, the Río Negro ruling became final.

4. What the courts said

The core of the case is whether a municipality can delegate verification and tax assessment duties to a private company. The Río Negro courts answered no, for the following reasons:

• They are inherent government functions. Verifying taxable events and assessing tax liabilities are public powers that cannot be transferred to private entities.

• Reports from a private party are not public documents. The findings were recorded by individuals who were not public officials. Therefore, these records lack the probative value of a public instrument and cannot support the tax assessment.

• A mayor's resolution is not sufficient. The municipality had granted the contractor's personnel powers similar to those of an inspector through an executive resolution, but such a regulation cannot deviate from the municipal Charter or fiscal ordinances.

  
  

This does not mean that the municipality loses the authority to collect the tax or to hire external advisory services. What it cannot do is have a private entity exercise the inspection and auditing functions that the law reserves for its public officials.

5. A trend: stricter requirements for municipalities

This case adds to another recent Supreme Court decision, issued in September 2026, in a mutual aid association's lawsuit against the Municipality of Pergamino regarding the Health and Safety Inspection Fee. There, the Court unanimously struck down the ruling of the Supreme Court of Buenos Aires Province that had upheld the collection, stating that:

• it is the municipality that must prove it actually rendered the service, and not the taxpayer who must prove it did not exist;

• inspections carried out after the lawsuit was filed are not sufficient to justify collections for prior periods;

• the amount of the fee may be challenged not only when it is confiscatory: it must bear a reasonable relationship to the cost of the service (a criterion particularly emphasized in Judge Rosatti's vote).

Both cases point in the same direction: municipal taxes require an actual provision of services, substantiated by the municipality itself through its own officials.

This content is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice for a specific case.