The European Private Equity & Venture Capital Association has launched its fourth Benchmarking study of European tax and legal environments at EVCA’s Policy Meeting in Brussels today.

The study, carried out in collaboration with KPMG M&A Tax Services, assesses the tax and legal situation across 27 European countries for limited partners and fund management companies, investee companies, as well as the environment for retaining talent at both investment firms and investee companies.

The aim of the study is to enable comparisons between different regimes, to highlight best practice and to engender more efficient tax and legal frameworks across a more integrated internal European market.

The study found that the gap between Europe’s most and least favourable tax and legal environments has widened considerably. This year the highest ranking country[1] achieved 1.23, compared with 1.27 in 2006, and the lowest achieved 2.40, compared with 2.35 in 2006.