The European Commission applauded new rules approved at a recent Economic and Financial Affairs Council (ECOFIN) meeting that will make it easier for the European Union (EU) to prevent tax avoidance by multinational companies.

"Today is yet another success story in our campaign for fairer taxation," Commissioner for Economic and Financial Affairs, Taxation and Customs Pierre Moscovici said , according to a release from the European Commission. "Step by step, we are eliminating the channels used by certain companies to escape taxation. I congratulate the Member States for agreeing on this tangible measure to clamp down on tax abuse and install a fairer tax environment in the EU."

The new regulation, which builds upon the Anti-Tax Avoidance Directive (ATAD), will help prevent multinational companies from using the discrepancies between the tax systems of member states and non-EU countries to their advantage. These situations, called hybrid mismatches, result in some incomes and entities being taxed differently in different countries, allowing some companies to avoid all taxation.

The new rules, which will go into effect on Jan. 1, 2020, will prevent these hybrid mismatches from being exploited in the EU, including in cases that involve countries that are not member states. The provisions were speedily approved, with the recent agreement coming not quite four months after their initial proposal by the EC.