Living in Laos: Income tax law revised in 2025, official text in Lao, Laos not on France's list of tax treaties

This page reports information published by the Official Gazette of Laos, the Ministry of Finance, the official news agency KPL, the BOFiP (French Public Finances Bulletin), and service-public.gouv.fr. The National Assembly of Laos revised the Income Tax Law in June 2025, following Law No. 67/NA of June 18, 2019. The revised text is published in the Official Gazette and on the Ministry of Finance website in Lao only, without an English version.

Laos is not included in the BOFiP list of tax treaties concluded by France. The tax residency criteria for individuals and the income tax scale are not detailed here: this page does not include any figures that are not confirmed by an official source.

Income tax law: what official sources state

The table below lists, by date, the official publications read for this page.

The Official Journal entry displays two separate dates: a date of enactment (June 25, 2025) and a date of publication (June 19, 2026); the page does not explain these dates. The effective date of the revised law is not detailed here. The Official Journal indicates that the act does not have an English version listed on its entry.

Tax residence and personal income tax

The tax residency criteria for individuals are not detailed here. The current personal income tax rates are also not detailed here; they can be found in the revised law, published in Lao in the Official Gazette of Laos and on the Ministry of Finance website (links in the sources).

The official press articles consulted for this page contain neither residency criteria nor applicable rates for individuals. KPL, in its report of June 24, 2025, notes that the law had not undergone any major changes since 2019 and does not cite any rates for individuals.

What KPL reports from the 2025 review

The KPL report of June 24, 2025 (English version) describes the revision guidelines:

• the addition of new sources of taxable income, including carbon credits and non-timber forest products;
• encouraging micro-enterprises to keep proper accounts, in order to improve their access to financing;
• tax incentives, including tax breaks on profits for publicly traded companies and small businesses;
• a minimum tax on the profits of multinationals, without a rate indicated in the article.

The Lao version of KPL (same date) indicates, for the incentive measure, a reduction in the profit tax rate from 13 % to 10 %. These elements relate to companies and are reported as announced during the presentation of the project: the adopted text is not detailed here.

Relationship with France: Laos is not included in the BOFiP list

The BOFiP annex "List of tax treaties concluded by France" (version published on 29/04/2026) only lists treaties in force on 1 January 2026. Laos is not included: the annex lists Kuwait and then Latvia, without any entry for Laos. This annex does not address the question of whether another agreement exists; the page makes no mention of it.

The BOFiP (Official Bulletin of Public Finances) reiterates, with regard to Article 4 B of the French General Tax Code (CGI) (§ 10), that individuals are considered domiciled in France if they have their home or principal residence there, if they carry out a professional activity there, whether salaried or not, unless it is carried out on an ancillary basis, and if they have the center of their economic interests there. It specifies that double taxation treaties mitigate the effects of this definition, as international law prevails over domestic law (§ 10), and that taxpayers domiciled in France are subject to unlimited tax liability, subject to the provisions of these treaties (§ 20).

Service-public.gouv.fr (page verified on April 15, 2026) describes the situation of a French citizen who goes to live or work abroad:

• If he is a tax resident in France, he is taxable on all his income; if he is a non-resident, he is most often taxable only on his income from French sources;
• In the year of departure, he declares the income received from January 1st to the date of departure, with this date and his new address, and the income from French sources received afterwards on form 2042-NR;
• For French-source income of a non-resident, minimum rates of 20 % up to €29,579 of income and 30 % above that apply, the higher amount between the progressive scale and these rates being retained;
• The page does not detail the criteria for tax residence, which it says are determined by the tax authorities according to the situation.

Leaving France is subject to exit tax and tax residence: our dedicated pages, listed below, detail these points.

What this page does not cover

It does not detail the criteria for tax residency for individuals, the income tax scale and rates, the taxation of dividends, interest, and capital gains, the purchase of real estate by a foreigner, local taxes, inheritance and gift taxes, the effective date of the revised law, social security, or residency permits. These points fall under Laotian law and should be verified with the Laotian Ministry of Finance and its tax authorities. Balmont Conseil is not a law firm or a local tax advisor: local tax matters should be verified with a professional based in Laos.

What changes depending on your situation

• Your resident or non-resident status under the revised Lao law, which is verified in its Lao text.
• The nature of your income: salary, dividends, interest, rent, capital gains.
• Your tax residence in France, year by year, in the absence of a treaty in the BOFiP list.
• The location of your assets and accounts determines which declarations must be filed in France.

The rule depends on your situation. No results are guaranteed.