Treaty detail
United States - Mexico tax treaty
A practical treaty page built around the official treaty text, key withholding categories, permanent-establishment rules, and article-level summaries.
Signed
1992-09-18
Effective
1994-01-01
Articles seeded
6
Withholding snapshot
Dividends
Individual rate: 10% · Corporate rate: 5%
The lower 5 percent corporate rate generally depends on a direct-ownership threshold under the treaty as amended. Certain pension and qualifying-entity cases may face even lower withholding under the 2002 protocol.
Interest
Rate: 15%
The general 15 percent ceiling can be reduced to 4.9 percent for qualifying bank and financial-institution interest, and to 10 percent for certain other categories. Government and central-bank interest may obtain better treatment.
Royalties
Rate: 10%
The treaty generally limits source-country withholding on royalties to 10 percent for the core copyright, patent, and know-how categories. Mexican domestic royalty withholding rules can apply where the treaty conditions are not met.
Permanent establishment
Construction threshold: more than 6 months
Dependent-agent analysis remains important and includes specified habitual-conclusion-of-contracts wording under the treaty.
Other treaty flags
Pension treatment is article-specific. The 2002 protocol clarified several pension and social-security-related fact patterns.
Seeded article summaries
Article 4
Residence
Defines treaty residence and provides tie-breaker tests for dual residents.
Article 4 of the Mexico treaty matters particularly for cross-border individuals and for entities whose residence depends on incorporation versus place-of-effective-management analysis under the treaty wording.
Article 5
Permanent Establishment
Sets the business-presence threshold including construction-site and service-PE rules.
The Mexico treaty uses a 6-month construction-site threshold and includes a service-PE provision for the furnishing of services beyond a defined number of days. Practitioners often note that this PE threshold is materially shorter than the 12-month standard in many other U.S. treaties.
Article 7
Business Profits
Generally reserves business profits to the residence state unless a PE exists in the other state.
Article 7 is the operating rule for cross-border services, but the shorter PE thresholds in Article 5 make this article less protective than in many other U.S. treaties.
Article 10
Dividends
Caps source-country withholding on dividends at treaty ceilings.
Article 10 produces the 10 percent and 5 percent treaty results in IRS Treaty Table 1, with the lower corporate rate dependent on a direct-ownership threshold.
Article 11
Interest
Limits source-country withholding on interest with reduced rates for qualifying bank and financial-institution interest.
Article 11 produces the 15 percent general ceiling but also a 4.9 percent reduced rate for qualifying bank interest. This makes interest documentation particularly important under the Mexico treaty.
Article 12
Royalties
Caps royalties withholding at a 10 percent ceiling under the treaty.
Article 12 generally limits source-country royalty withholding to 10 percent. Mexican domestic rules can apply higher rates where the treaty conditions are not satisfied.
Official text
Other treaties involving these jurisdictions
Computed from the cross-reference graph. Links open the related entity on this site.
This entry cites
- TreatyUS–GB treaty
- TreatyUS–CA treaty
- TreatyUS–DE treaty
- TreatyUS–FR treaty
- TreatyUS–JP treaty
- TreatyUS–NL treaty
- TreatyUS–AU treaty
- TreatyUS–KR treaty
Primary sources
- IRS Mexico treaty documents pageVerified 2026-05-20
- Official U.S.-Mexico treaty PDFVerified 2026-05-20
- IRS Tax Treaty Table 1Verified 2026-05-20
- SAT - Mexican tax authority treaty pageVerified 2026-05-20
Important disclaimer
This library is for general tax education only. Always verify filing obligations, due dates, and tax consequences against the cited primary source or with a qualified tax professional.