Tax Incentives for Participants of Regional Investment Projects as Preferences

Under the general rule, tex incentives are provided in order to stimulate certain sectors of the economy or activities, contribute to the achievement of social and political objectives before the State. Contemporary tax laws of any country provide many tax incentives, and Russian tax laws are no exception. Meanwhile, tax incentives are in full discretion of the State and are granted at all levels of public power, with the regions having fairly broad powers in this matter. In this regard, without disputing the importance of tax incentivization, it is impossible to fail to notice that the provision of tax incentives may be unequal for the competitors operating on the same commodity market, and some of them, for some reason or other, are not subject to obtaining tax preferences. Moreover, although the tax incentives are provided by the State, the rules for granting them are not related to the procedure intended to grant state preferences under antitrust legislation. The incentives granted at the regional level that may lead to an imbalance in economic entities’ operation in various territories of the Russian Federation are of primery concern. On the example of tax incentives provided for participants of regional investment projects, the paper elucidates the issue of the balance between tax incentives under the Tax Code of the Russian Federation and preferences under antitrust laws. Comparing the essential features of the legal institutions under consideration, the author comes to the conclusion that regional tax incentives should be considered as a type of preferences, although antitrust regulation does not permit proper monitoring of the procedure of granting such preferences.