Réunion
| Pros |
|---|
| Significant tax exemptions through specific free zone regimes and local investment incentives. |
| Access to European Union legal standards for strong property rights and institutional stability. |
| Modern infrastructure and high-speed connectivity within a strategic Indian Ocean location. |
| Cons |
|---|
| Extensive French bureaucratic requirements and rigid labor market regulations impacting operational flexibility. |
| High social charges and mandatory contributions increasing the overall cost of employment. |
| Significant geographic distance from major markets causing high logistics costs and supply chain delays. |
Long story short: Here, the French state showers you with tax breaks, generous investment write-offs, reduced VAT, all to push you to invest. Surprising for a place that taxes itself so hard back home.
The catch: same labor code, same payroll charges as mainland France, and a cost of living that climbs fast since everything arrives by boat. Local unemployment is brutal.
Other than that: banks as solid as in France, little corruption, decent infrastructure. Volcano, mountain cirques, beaches, and food (Creole and Indian) that's excellent, and in Saint-Denis's nice neighborhoods, insecurity is something you mostly hear about on the radio.
Will your income be taxed?
Long story short: NO.
Réunion doesn't tax personal income, and nobody comes sniffing around when you settle in. No withholding, no tax return, no centre-of-vital-interests trap waiting to snap shut.
Earn what you want: the taxman here simply doesn't know your name.
Will your wealth be taxed?
Long story short: NO.
Réunion keeps its hands off what you hold. No capital gains tax, no annual wealth grab, no inheritance regime.
Your portfolio compounds in peace and leaves the way it came in; nobody's standing at the door with their palm out.
Easy to run a company there?
Long story short: YES, BUT EXPOSED.
Réunion has no corporate income tax but stacks the two nastiest non-fiscal frictions: criminal liability for misuse of corporate assets (jail on the table for sloppy intra-company spending) and public registries (your name served up to anyone with a browser).
The sticker says zero; the exposure says otherwise, on every other axis.
A good fit for a holding?
Long story short: NO.
Réunion has no treaty network at all, which buries the holding question, full stop.
Every dividend in or out eats the statutory withholding at full rate, and no domestic regime can patch a hole that sits on the source side. Don't park a holding here.
| Country | Status | Dividends | Interest | Royalties |
|---|---|---|---|---|
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| ∅ // no treaties match | ||||
Easy to come and go?
Long story short: SOME.
Réunion taxes your worldwide income while you're resident, but at least the exit is free: no exit tax on the way out.
Leaving costs you paperwork, not money; your unrealised gains walk out the door with you, untouched.
Is your money watched?
Long story short: NO.
Foreign tax offices see next to nothing of what you do in Réunion: it has signed few exchange frameworks.
But the corporate registries are public: your shareholdings and directorships are one search away for anyone curious. Invisible from abroad, on display at home.
Is it blacklisted?
Long story short: NO.
Réunion sits on no major blacklist, though it's outside the FATF club.
Some counterparties will run a bit of extra due diligence out of habit, but there's no formal stigma: you won't get hassled for dealing with it.
Do you feel free there?
Long story short:
Not enough data to tell how free you'd actually feel in Réunion.
Connected to the world?
Long story short: POORLY CONNECTED.
The two rails that matter are both dead in Réunion. Stripe won't onboard you, so card payments mean a foreign structure or a local processor with its own rules. Amazon doesn't deliver either.
Some secondary services run (3/11), but for an online business this is swimming against the current.
Other jurisdictions worth comparing
Picked by similarity of strategic profile to Réunion. No editorial ranking — neighbours in the same scoring space.