The conversation nearly always starts the same way: “I've read about trusts, I want something like that too.” The answer surprises the client every time: Romania has had, since 2011, its own continental equivalent of the trust. It is called the fiducie, it is set out in the Civil Code in two and a half pages, it works, it produces a genuine separation of assets, and almost nobody uses it.
The reasons for this absence are not mysterious. They are technical, fiscal and, to a large extent, cultural. Understanding them says more about what can and cannot lawfully be done with assets in Romania than ten presentations about exotic jurisdictions.
Under Article 773 of the Civil Code, the fiducie is the transaction by which one or more settlors transfer present or future proprietary rights to one or more fiduciaries, who exercise them for a specified purpose, for the benefit of one or more beneficiaries. These rights form an autonomous patrimony, separate from the fiduciary's other rights and obligations.
The person who separates assets from their patrimony and entrusts them.
The person who formally becomes the holder of the rights, but administers them solely for the agreed purpose; not an owner in the economic sense.
The person for whose benefit the assets are administered; may be the settlor, the fiduciary, or a third party.
The difference from a mandate or a simple administration is essential: in a fiducie, the right leaves the settlor's patrimony and enters a separate patrimony. It is not an accounting fiction, but a real transfer of title, with real effects on creditors.
Article 776 of the Civil Code expressly and exhaustively restricts the circle of those who may act as fiduciary: credit institutions, investment and investment-management companies, SSIF (investment services companies), and legally established insurance and reinsurance companies; and public notaries and lawyers, whatever form their practice takes.
The list is exhaustive: no other person may be a fiduciary. Not a trusted relative, not the accountant, not a friend, not a consultancy, not your own company. The restriction is deliberate: the legislator wanted the temporary holder of a patrimony that does not belong to them economically to be a supervised entity or a professional with disciplinary liability and insurance. The practical consequence: the fiducie cannot be a “family” instrument, run in a closed circle. By its very construction, it puts a regulated professional between you and your assets.
The fiducie is concluded in notarial form, a requirement ad validitatem, not merely for evidence. A private document produces no effect.
On pain of absolute nullity, the deed must set out the rights transferred, the duration (which may not exceed 33 years), the identity of the parties and of the beneficiary, the purpose of the fiducie, and the extent of the fiduciary's powers.
The contract and any amendments to it must be registered with the competent tax authority, at the fiduciary's request, within one month of being concluded, again on pain of absolute nullity. A missed deadline cannot be cured: the contract is not voidable, it is void.
Enforceability against third parties is acquired from the date of entry in the National Register of Security over Movable Property (the former AEGRM), and for rights in rem over immovable property, through registration in the land register. The Civil Code also provided for a national register of fiducies, whose organisation was to be set out by government decision; at present, that record-keeping function is performed by the Central Register of Fiducies and Legal Arrangements Similar to Fiducies, run by ANAF.
This is the part for which the institution is worth discussing. Article 786 of the Civil Code governs the limitation of liability based on the separation of the patrimonies.
The assets in the fiduciary patrimony may be pursued by the creditors of the transaction itself and by those creditors of the settlor who held a security interest in the assets, enforceable before the fiducie was set up. The settlor's other creditors can reach these assets only under a final judgment setting the contract aside or declaring it unenforceable against them, with retroactive effect.
The effect that matters most: the fiduciary's personal creditors cannot reach the fiduciary patrimony. If the lawyer or the bank acting as fiduciary runs into difficulty, the assets entrusted to them are not part of the general security available to their creditors. This is genuine separation of assets, not a contractual appearance, and it is exactly what is missing from any arrangement along the lines of “I'll put it in the name of someone I trust”.
NOTE: The fiducie does not launder the past and does not block existing creditors. The contract can be set aside or declared unenforceable against them, with retroactive effect, and the settlor's creditors can then pursue the assets. A fiduciary transfer made when a debt already exists, an inspection has started, or proceedings have been brought is subject to the Paulian action (Article 1562 of the Civil Code) exactly like any other deed, with the aggravating factor that the notarial form, the tax registration and the publicity make it perfectly traceable, dated to the day, and impossible to challenge as to its date. The fiducie is an instrument for advance planning, not a last-minute shelter.
Article 775 of the Civil Code contains a single sentence, and that sentence explains why the fiducie has not become the succession instrument that many would like it to be: a fiducie contract is struck by absolute nullity if it achieves an indirect gift for the benefit of the beneficiary.
In plain terms: the fiducie cannot be a disguised gift and cannot be a hidden will. The reasoning is the protection of forced heirs. The consequence has to be said directly: the fiducie is not an instrument for passing wealth to children. Anyone who tries this is not building a structure but a void contract, with the assets falling back into the estate and into the general security available to creditors. This is the structural difference from the Anglo-Saxon trust, which is precisely a vehicle for transmission: the Romanian fiducie was transposed without the gift-giving component. It is an instrument for administration and security, not for gratuitous benefit.
The transfer of the fiduciary patrimony from the settlor to the fiduciary does not generate taxable income at the time of the transfer, for the parties involved.
When the settlor is also the beneficiary, the fiduciary keeps separate accounting records and sends them the income and expenses of the administration every quarter, and the tax value of the assets remains the one they had with the settlor.
When the beneficiary is the fiduciary or a third party, income received by an individual beneficiary is taxed under the rules for income from other sources, except where the beneficiary is the settlor themselves.
The remuneration of a notary or lawyer acting as fiduciary is taxed together with their professional income. Local taxes and duties on the assets are paid by the fiduciary, from 1 January of the year following the one in which the contract was concluded.
The legal basis is Article 30 of the Tax Code (fiducie contracts, for corporate income tax) and Article 63 of the Tax Code, the general rules applicable to income earned from the fiducie transaction, under Title IV.
Since 2021, the records have been kept in the Central register of fiducies run by ANAF, and the registration procedure was approved by OPANAF nr. 1193/2021. Under OPANAF nr. 505/2026, published in Monitorul Oficial nr. 340 of 28 April 2026, the procedure was updated to incorporate the requirements imposed by Legea nr. 129/2019 on preventing money laundering, as amended by Legea nr. 164/2025.
What matters: the express obligation to declare and update the beneficial owner, including for contracts registered earlier, meaning a retroactive review of the data; an ex officio deregistration mechanism where a declaration is missing or not updated; and administrative penalties for non-compliance. Deregistration affects the legal traceability of the structure and its ability to produce effects, including in its commercial and banking relationships. Anyone who sees the fiducie as an instrument of discretion should read these lines twice: the fiducie is, on the contrary, one of the most transparent structures in Romanian law, notarised, registered for tax purposes, published, and reported at the level of the beneficial owner.
The most common use, especially with credit institutions: the asset is transferred under a fiducie to secure a loan, and the creditor is in a better position than a mortgagee, not competing with the general body of creditors in the debtor's insolvency, because the asset no longer belongs to the debtor.
Administering a patrimony during a dispute or an incapacity, with a regulated professional on hand and written rules of administration.
Separating an asset from operational risk, but only when built in advance, with a genuine economic purpose and no gift-giving component.
The institution is not taught to practitioners and has no market. Many lawyers have never concluded a fiducie contract.
The most sought-after use, passing wealth to children, is exactly the one prohibited on pain of absolute nullity.
Notarial form, a paid professional fiduciary, separate accounting, reporting: real fixed costs for a benefit that is often obtained more simply through a corporate structure.
There is no body of case law to say how the institution behaves at the margins. For anyone who wants predictability, this is exactly the problem.
A lawyer who presented the fiducie to you as a miracle solution would be leaving out exactly these four points. It remains the right instrument for precise situations, and the wrong choice for most of the objectives it is asked to serve.
No. A fiducie that achieves an indirect gift for the benefit of the beneficiary is absolutely void (Article 775 of the Civil Code). The gratuitous transfer of wealth to children is carried out through the classic succession instruments: a gift, a will, a parent's partition, subject to the rules on forced heirship. The fiducie does not sidestep these rules; it is voided if it tries to.
No. Article 776 of the Civil Code exhaustively restricts who may be a fiduciary to credit institutions, investment and investment-management companies, investment services companies, insurance and reinsurance companies, public notaries and lawyers. Any other appointment does not produce a valid fiducie.
No. Article 780 of the Civil Code provides for absolute nullity where registration does not take place within one month of the contract being concluded. Absolute nullity cannot be cured by confirmation, and a late filing does not revive the contract. The only way forward is to conclude a new contract, with everything that means for its date, and therefore for its exposure to the Paulian action.
It depends entirely on when it was set up. The fiduciary assets cannot be pursued by the fiduciary's personal creditors, but the contract can be set aside or declared unenforceable against them, with retroactive effect, at the request of the settlor's creditors. In insolvency, the 2-year suspect period regime under Legea nr. 85/2014 also applies, with its presumptions of fraud. A fiducie set up during the healthy years of a business holds up; one set up on the eve of trouble is exactly the target of these mechanisms.
This article is strictly informative and does not constitute legal or tax advice. Individual situations must be assessed on their own facts. Legislation as at 18 July 2026.
If the family or the wealth spans more than one state, the other analyses are grouped under trusts and succession. For structuring the transfer, see estate planning.
Time limits run from the date of communication. A first conversation clarifies what is being alleged, what you need to substantiate and how the defence is built, before an estimate becomes a tax assessment decision.