Your SASU makes €60,000 this year. Distributed to you, its dividends bear 31.4%: you keep €33,786.
Distributed to a holding that reinvests them, just 5% of them is taxed: it keeps €48,881, that is €15,095 more. But if you wanted the money to live on, it would cost you €253 more a year.
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Information verified on October 16, 2026. Indicative calculator with no legal force. The figures it applies are taken from official sources and dated: only your tax notice and the tax authorities are binding.
The official pages where we read the rules and amounts applied here.
When your company pays its dividends to its holding, the holding is only taxed on 5% of their amount: this is the parent-subsidiary regime. It only has to own at least 5% of the capital and keep those shares for two years. Paid to you, the same dividends bear 31.4% of tax and social levies.
The holding postpones the tax to the day it pays its money to you: that is then a dividend like any other, at the same flat rate. For what you spend each month, it earns you nothing, and its accounts cost you on top.
If the holding sells your company after owning it for at least two years, its capital gain is only taxed on 12% of its amount. Sold by you, the same gain bears 31.4%. If you contribute to a holding a company that is already worth something, the gain built up so far stays yours: its tax is only deferred.
The law only makes the dividends the manager receives himself carry contributions. But in 2023, the Court of Cassation made those that a practitioner alone in his company paid to his holding carry them. And once your shares are in the holding, your status as manager is no longer settled: assimilated employee on a reading of the law, self-employed if one looks at who controls the holding, as the Court of Cassation did in 2012. Under a SASU, neither question arises.
| Profit before corporate tax | Distributed to you | Kept by the holding | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|
| €20,000 | €11,662 | €16,873 | €5,211 |
| €40,000 | €23,324 | €33,745 | €10,421 |
| €60,000 | €33,786 | €48,881 | €15,095 |
| €100,000 | €54,365 | €78,656 | €24,290 |
| €200,000 | €105,815 | €153,093 | €47,278 |
All the profit is distributed after corporate tax. Your dividends bear the 31.4% flat tax, the holding 15% on its first €42,500 of profit. The gap only holds for the money that stays in the holding.
Karim is a developer. His SASU makes €60,000 a year after his salary, and he wants to buy a fellow developer's agency within two years.
After €10,750 of corporate tax, €49,250 is left to distribute. Distributed to him, it leaves him €33,786.
Distributed to a holding, it only costs him €369 of tax: the holding keeps €48,881.
Every year, Karim sets aside €15,095 more for his purchase by going through a holding. If he wanted to live on that money, it would instead cost him €253 more a year, not counting its accounts.
Write down what the holding will fund. That project is what protects it from being challenged.
Have the arrangement checked by your accountant before setting anything up.
In an EURL, put the question of your status as manager to the Urssaf in writing.
Keep your company as it is. A holding with no project only brings you one more set of accounts.
To lower what paying yourself costs you, look at the split between pay and dividends instead.
Run the calculation again the day a purchase or sale takes shape.
A holding cuts the tax on money that stays invested: the dividends flowing up to it are only taxed on 5% of their amount. On the money you pay yourself, it does not: that bears 31.4% in 2026, with or without a holding, and the holding adds its own tax.
Sold by a holding that has owned it for at least two years, your company is only taxed on 12% of the capital gain. For a €300,000 sale of shares bought for €1,000, the tax falls from €93,886 to €5,382. But the money stays in the holding: to receive it yourself, you will pay 31.4% on what it pays you.
A holding can be set up above an existing company, by contributing your shares to it. The tax on the gain built up so far is deferred automatically. If the holding sells within three years, it must reinvest at least 70% of the price in an economic activity, otherwise the deferred tax falls due.
To the letter of the law, dividends an EURL pays to a holding carry no contributions. But the Court of Cassation ruled the opposite in 2023, for a practitioner alone in his company. For an EURL in a liberal profession making €60,000 after €36,000 of net pay, you keep €28,392 directly, and the holding keeps between €5,953 and €20,489 more, depending on which reading prevails.
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