Modelo 720 and Modelo 721 are the two major informational obligations on foreign assets that affect Spanish tax residents. The first, in force since 2013, covers bank accounts, securities and real estate located outside Spanish territory. The second, effective from the 2023 tax year, extended the declaration perimeter to crypto-assets held with providers not based in Spain. Although they share the same declaration threshold — €50,000 — and informational nature, they differ in their deadlines, covered assets and penalty regime. This guide analyses both forms in detail for the 2026 tax year, including developments arising from DAC8 and the position of those taxed under the Beckham regime.
Who Must Declare: Tax Residence and Thresholds
The obligation to file Modelo 720 and Modelo 721 falls on Spanish tax residents — individuals and legal entities — who exceed the thresholds established in each case. Tax residence in Spain is determined, for individuals, by the rules of Article 9 of Law 35/2006 (LIRPF): presence in Spanish territory for more than 183 days during the calendar year, or location in Spain of the principal nucleus or base of economic activities or interests.
Modelo 720 Threshold
The obligation to file Modelo 720 arises when the aggregate value of assets and rights abroad belonging to each of the three blocks exceeds €50,000. The three blocks are independent of each other:
- Block 1 — Bank accounts: balance on 31 December or average balance for the fourth quarter, whichever is higher.
- Block 2 — Securities, rights, insurance and annuities: market value or surrender value on 31 December; for unlisted securities, the nominal value.
- Block 3 — Real estate and rights over real estate: acquisition value of the property or real right.
The €50,000 threshold is assessed per block: if foreign bank accounts total €60,000 but foreign securities total €30,000, there is an obligation to declare the accounts block but not the securities block.
Modelo 721 Threshold
For Modelo 721, the €50,000 threshold applies to the aggregate value of all crypto-assets held with foreign custodians, valued at market price on 31 December of the tax year. Unlike Modelo 720, there is no sub-division by blocks: all crypto-assets abroad — Bitcoin, Ethereum, stablecoins, NFTs with economic value, governance tokens — are aggregated in a single amount for threshold purposes.
Legal Entities
The obligation extends to companies and other legal entities with legal personality resident in Spain. Directors and legal representatives are responsible for filing. Foundations, cooperatives and other non-profit entities are also subject if they exceed the thresholds.
Excluded Persons
Residents in Spain covered by a non-resident tax treaty that assigns exclusive residence to the other contracting state are excluded, provided this is documented. Entities exempt from Corporate Income Tax under Article 9.1 of Law 27/2014 are also excluded.
Modelo 720 — Real Estate, Bank Accounts and Securities
Legal Basis
Modelo 720 is grounded in the Eighteenth Additional Provision of Law 58/2003 (General Taxation Law, LGT), introduced by Law 7/2012. The regulatory development is set out in Articles 42 bis, 42 ter and 54 bis of Royal Decree 1065/2007, which approves the General Regulation on Tax Management and Inspection Proceedings. Ministerial Order HAP/72/2013 approved the form and the electronic filing procedure.
What Modelo 720 Covers
Block 1 — Accounts with foreign financial institutions: Any current account, savings account, fixed-term deposit, credit account or similar financial product with banking institutions based outside Spain. Accounts must be declared in which the taxpayer is the holder, co-holder, beneficiary, authorised person, or holder of a power of disposal. Valuation is the higher of the balance on 31 December and the average balance for the fourth quarter of the tax year.
Block 2 — Securities, rights, insurance and annuities: This block covers a broad range of financial instruments: shares and interests in foreign companies, investment funds domiciled outside Spain (including foreign ETFs), life or disability insurance contracts where the insurer is abroad, and life or temporary annuities arising from the transfer of capital to foreign entities. Valuation is at the market price on 31 December, or at the surrender value for insurance policies.
Block 3 — Real estate and rights over real estate: Covers all real property — residential property, commercial premises, land, parking spaces — located abroad, including real rights over property (usufruct, bare ownership, surface right). Valuation is at acquisition cost, not current market value. Inherited property is valued at the value declared in the succession.
Practical Example
A Spanish-resident taxpayer has: (1) a current account at Deutsche Bank Germany with a balance of €65,000 on 31 December and an average fourth-quarter balance of €58,000; (2) an apartment in Lisbon acquired for €120,000; (3) an investment fund in Ireland valued at €35,000. Result: they must declare the accounts block (€65,000, exceeding the threshold) and the real estate block (€120,000), but not the securities block (€35,000, below the threshold).
Obligation to Renew the Declaration
Once the initial Modelo 720 has been filed, there is no obligation to re-file in subsequent years unless the value of any block has increased by more than €20,000 compared with the last year filed, or the ownership of or rights over previously declared assets have been extinguished. In these cases, the declaration updates or cancels the prior data.
Modelo 721 — Crypto-Assets Held Abroad
Entry into Force and Legal Basis
Modelo 721 was created by Law 11/2021 of 9 July on measures to prevent and combat tax fraud, which extended the Eighteenth Additional Provision of the LGT to include crypto-assets as a separately declarable category. The form entered into force for the 2023 tax year, with the first mandatory filing in January 2024. Ministerial Order HFP/887/2023 approved the form and the electronic filing procedure.
What Constitutes a Crypto-Asset Held Abroad
For Modelo 721 purposes, crypto-assets held abroad are those held with crypto-asset service providers (CASPs) whose registered office or principal place of business is outside Spain. The concept of crypto-asset is broad: any digital representation of value or rights that can be transferred and stored electronically via distributed ledger technology or similar.
Within the scope of Modelo 721:
- Bitcoin, Ethereum and other cryptocurrencies held on exchanges not based in Spain.
- Stablecoins (USDT, USDC, DAI) held with foreign custodians.
- NFTs with documented economic value.
- Governance tokens and utility tokens with a quoted market price.
- Crypto-assets in self-custody wallets (hardware wallets such as Ledger or Trezor, software wallets) where the provider is not based in Spain.
Crypto-assets deposited with exchanges or platforms whose registered office is in Spain are covered by Modelos 172 and 173 (informational declarations on crypto-asset transactions in Spain) and fall outside Modelo 721.
DAC8 Reinforces Controls from 2026
Council Directive (EU) 2023/2226 (DAC8), transposed in Spain with effect from 1 January 2026, establishes the automatic exchange of information between the tax authorities of Member States on crypto-assets held by their residents. From the 2025 tax year — with effective exchange in 2026 — exchanges and CASP service providers regulated in the EU will report directly to the AEAT the balances, transactions and gains of their Spanish-resident clients.
This makes Modelo 721 an active self-monitoring instrument: any discrepancy between the taxpayer’s declaration and information received by the AEAT via DAC8 will automatically generate verification alerts. In the medium term, the OECD’s CARF (Crypto-Asset Reporting Framework) will extend this mechanism to exchanges in non-EU jurisdictions — the United States, the United Kingdom, the United Arab Emirates — which have committed to implementation for the 2026–2027 tax years.
For more information on DAC8 and its impact on crypto-asset taxation, see our guide Crypto-Asset Taxation: DAC8 and Modelo 721.
Deadlines and Filing Procedure
Filing Deadlines
| Form | Tax Year | Filing Period |
|---|---|---|
| Modelo 720 | 2025 | 1 January 2026 — 31 March 2026 |
| Modelo 721 | 2025 | 1 January 2026 — 31 January 2026 |
| Modelo 720 | 2026 | 1 January 2027 — 31 March 2027 |
| Modelo 721 | 2026 | 1 January 2027 — 31 January 2027 |
The Modelo 720 deadline runs from 1 January to 31 March of the year following the declared tax year, with no possibility of extension. For the 2026 tax year, the filing period will run from 1 January to 31 March 2027.
The Modelo 721 deadline is shorter: from 1 January to 31 January of the following year. This means the 2025 tax year should have been declared by 31 January 2026 at the latest. For the 2026 tax year, the filing deadline closes on 31 January 2027.
Neither form admits an extension or deferral. Once the deadline has passed, any filing is treated as late and is subject to the applicable penalties.
Filing Procedure
Both forms must be filed exclusively electronically through the AEAT’s electronic headquarters (sede.agenciatributaria.gob.es), using one of the following means of identification:
- Recognised electronic certificate (FNMT, Camerfirma or others).
- Electronic DNI with active chip.
- Cl@ve PIN or Cl@ve Permanente (for individuals).
There is no paper filing option and no option for in-person filing at AEAT offices. Non-residents in Spain who are nonetheless required to file either form must obtain a Spanish electronic certificate or act through a representative with sufficient authority.
Tax advisers and administrative managers may file both forms on behalf of their clients via the AEAT’s electronic authorisation system or through the professionals’ portal.
For guidance on filing and managing your reporting obligation, contact the BMC international tax team.
Penalties for Non-Filing or Inaccurate Filing
Current Penalty Regime (Post-CJEU)
The judgment of the Court of Justice of the European Union of 27 January 2022 (case C-788/19), issued in response to the infringement action brought by the European Commission against Spain, declared that the original Modelo 720 penalty regime was contrary to EU law as disproportionate and incompatible with the freedoms of capital movement and establishment guaranteed by the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU).
The CJEU found the following features of the original regime disproportionate:
- The presumption that undeclared assets constituted unjustified capital gains, admitting no evidence to the contrary and subject to no limitation period.
- Penalties proportional to the value of the assets (150%), incompatibly high relative to non-compliance with a purely formal obligation.
- Automatic application of those penalties without any consideration of the circumstances of the case.
As a result, Ley 5/2022, of 9 March (BOE-A-2022-3784) aligned the Modelo 720 penalty regime with the standard required by the CJEU. The penalties in force since that reform are as follows:
For Modelo 720:
| Situation | Penalty |
|---|---|
| Late filing without prior request | €100 per data item or set of items, minimum €1,500 |
| Late filing following prior AEAT request | €200 per data item or set of items, minimum €3,000 |
| Non-filing or filing with false or incomplete data | Serious tax infringement; penalty of 50%–150% of tax unpaid if linked IRPF/CIT regularisation |
For Modelo 721:
Modelo 721 penalties are more severe than the reformed Modelo 720:
| Situation | Penalty |
|---|---|
| Late filing without prior request | €100 per data item, minimum €1,500 |
| Non-filing or non-compliance following request | €5,000 per data item or set of items, minimum €10,000 |
This asymmetry reflects the AEAT’s priority in monitoring crypto-asset assets, which have historically carried a greater opacity risk than traditional financial assets.
Additional Consequences: IRPF Regularisation
Although Modelo 720 and Modelo 721 are informational declarations — they do not generate any tax payable in themselves — their omission can trigger verification proceedings in the IRPF or Corporate Income Tax. If the AEAT establishes that undeclared assets generated income (interest, dividends, capital gains, rental income) that was also not declared in the IRPF, the regularisation may include:
- Assessment of the unpaid tax liability.
- Surcharges of 1%–20% (voluntary late self-assessment) or default interest.
- Penalty of 50%–150% of the shortfall if classified as a serious or very serious tax infringement.
- In cases where the evaded tax liability exceeds €120,000, possible criminal proceedings for tax fraud (Article 305 of the Criminal Code).
Exemptions and Special Cases
Beckham Regime and Modelo 720/721
A question that frequently arises for impatriates covered by the special regime of Article 93 LIRPF (Beckham Law) is whether this regime exempts them from the Modelo 720 and Modelo 721 obligations. The answer, correctly understood, is: yes — during the regime period.
The Modelo 720 and Modelo 721 obligations under the 18th Additional Provision of the LGT are grounded in the concept of obligación personal (worldwide income/asset taxation): they apply to taxpayers who are required to declare their worldwide income in Spain. Beckham-regime taxpayers, by contrast, are taxed under IRNR rules — obligación real — on Spanish-source income only. Their foreign assets and foreign-source income (dividends, interest, capital gains earned outside Spain) fall entirely outside the Spanish tax perimeter while the regime applies. Per published AEAT administrative criterion, they are therefore not subject to the foreign-asset reporting obligations during the six years of the regime.
What this means in practice: an executive relocated to Spain who is taxed under Article 93 LIRPF and holds foreign bank accounts, an overseas investment portfolio, or crypto-assets on foreign exchanges — even if well above the €50,000 thresholds — is not required to file Modelo 720 or Modelo 721 for any year in which the Beckham regime applies.
The obligation resumes after the regime ends. In the first tax year following the end of the Beckham period — whether by expiry of the six years, voluntary waiver, or exclusion — the taxpayer becomes an ordinary IRPF resident taxed on worldwide income (obligación personal). From that year, the Modelo 720 and Modelo 721 obligations apply in full. If the foreign-asset thresholds are met in that first ordinary-IRPF year, an initial declaration must be filed.
This is one of the most practically significant aspects of the Beckham regime for executives with substantial overseas wealth: six years without Modelo 720/721 obligations is a genuine planning advantage, but the transition year requires careful preparation to avoid missing the first filing deadline.
For a comprehensive analysis of the Beckham regime and its tax implications, see our guide Beckham Law 2026: requirements, benefits and application.
Dual Tax Residence
In cases of tax residence conflict between Spain and another state, the taxpayer must apply the rules of the applicable double taxation agreement (if one exists) to determine in which of the two countries they are tax resident. If the treaty assigns exclusive tax residence to the other state, no obligation arises to file Modelo 720 or Modelo 721 with the AEAT, but the taxpayer must adequately document their tax residence in the other country.
Inheritances and Transfers
Heirs who accept an inheritance that includes foreign assets are required to declare those assets in the tax year in which the inheritance is accepted, if the value exceeds the thresholds. Valuation is at the value declared for Inheritance Tax purposes.
Entities Subject to Income Attribution Regime
Communities of property, civil partnerships and other entities subject to the income attribution regime must file Modelo 720 at entity level, and the partners or co-owners who hold an interest in those assets must not include them in their individual declarations to avoid double-counting.
Common Mistakes and How to Avoid Them
1. Confusing the Modelo 721 Deadline with the Modelo 720 Deadline
The most common mistake among taxpayers with crypto-assets abroad is assuming that Modelo 721 has the same deadline as Modelo 720 (31 March). Modelo 721 closes on 31 January, two months earlier. For the 2025 tax year, the deadline was 31 January 2026. Once that deadline passes, any filing is late.
2. Failing to Include Self-Custody Wallets
Many taxpayers file Modelo 721 with exchange balances only, omitting crypto-assets in hardware wallets or self-custody software wallets. If the hardware provider (Ledger, Trezor) or software wallet is not based in Spain, the crypto-assets are treated as held abroad and must be included. The AEAT may cross-reference this information with the IRPF if it detects movements to or from undeclared wallets.
3. Valuing Crypto-Assets at Cost Rather than Market Price
Unlike the real estate block of Modelo 720 (which uses acquisition value), Modelo 721 requires valuation at market price on 31 December. Using cost price may result in an undervalued declaration, with potential penalty exposure. It is advisable to capture and retain the historical prices on 31 December from recognised sources (CoinMarketCap, CoinGecko or equivalent).
4. Failing to Update Modelo 720 Following Prior Filings
The Modelo 720 variation threshold (increase of more than €20,000 compared with the last filed year) requires active monitoring of asset values. Taxpayers who filed Modelo 720 several years ago and have not revisited it may have exceeded the variation threshold due to appreciation of foreign real estate without having noticed.
5. Missing the First Modelo 720/721 Filing After the Beckham Regime Ends
Taxpayers under the Beckham Law are not required to file Modelo 720 or Modelo 721 during the six-year regime period (see section above). The critical mistake — and a very common one — is failing to file in the first ordinary-IRPF year after the regime ends. At that point, the taxpayer transitions from obligación real to obligación personal and must declare their worldwide assets for the first time.
Because the obligation did not exist for the preceding six years, there is no prior Modelo 720 on record. The first filing after exit must declare all foreign asset blocks that exceed the thresholds as if from scratch. Missing this first deadline triggers late-filing penalties (€100 per data item, minimum €1,500) and can also attract IRPF regularisations if the undeclared assets generated income during the transition year. Planning the exit from the Beckham regime — ideally 12 months in advance — must include a Modelo 720/721 readiness assessment.
6. Failing to Retain Supporting Documentation
Both forms may be subject to verification proceedings. The AEAT may request documents evidencing the declared values: bank statements, portfolio valuations, property purchase deeds. The absence of documentation can turn a formally correct declaration into a protracted inspection. It is advisable to retain documentation for a minimum of four years (the general tax limitation period under Article 66 LGT), and in the case of real estate, for four years following disposal.
If you hold assets or crypto-assets abroad and wish to verify whether your reporting obligations are fully up to date, the BMC international and non-resident tax team can review your situation, prepare and file both forms, and advise you on the relationship between the informational declarations and your IRPF or Corporate Income Tax return. See also our complete guide on crypto-asset taxation and, if you are taxed or considering being taxed under the special impatriate regime, our guide on the Beckham Law.
