The new Spanish Startups Law: Special reference to stock options, carried interest and digital nomads regime

In Spain, an incipient ecosystem of emerging companies has developed for the last years driven by the success of digital companies born from small innovative projects, by the access to a vast knowledge and data on the Internet and advances in scientific and technical fields.

This new economy is an important lever for growth and prosperity, as it is based on high value-added activities, has high growth potential and develops new products and services that facilitate or improve social, economic, environmental or cultural procedures.

The characters of these emerging companies do not fit well within the traditional regulatory frameworks in the tax, commercial, civil and labor fields. This justifies a different treatment with respect to conventional companies. That is the reason behind creating a specific regime (the “Startup regime”) through the new Startup Law, which has entered into force in December 2022.