BSPCE: no contributions, but a line in the DSN payroll return

The framework · Cassandre Nogues, lawyer

Since the 2025 Finance Act, the gain is read in two stages. The exercise gain, being the value of the share on subscription less the exercise price, is a gain of an employment nature, taxed at 12.8 % (30 % where the beneficiary has less than three years of activity within the company), plus social levies. The disposal gain follows the regime applicable to capital gains on securities.

Two practical consequences, often discovered too late: shares issued on exercise of BSPCE can no longer be held within a PEA or an employee savings plan, and the exercise gain is not wiped out by a contribution to a holding company. The new regime applies to shares subscribed since 1 January 2025, whatever the date on which the warrants were granted.

The founder's view · Arnaud Albalat, co-founder and CTO of Galadrim

BSPCE are the simplest tool for giving the people who matter a long-term stake. A bonus rewards the year just gone; a warrant gives a share of what will be built over the next five. Nothing to pay out at the outset, neither for the beneficiary nor for the company. What takes time is not the structuring, it is explaining a valuation to someone who has never held shares.

The payroll view · Laura Sinthe, Puncto

The gain does not fall within the base for social security contributions: nothing to pay, neither for the employee nor for the employer. But the company must complete the “BSPCE” block S89.G00.89 in the DSN return for the month concerned: date, number of shares, acquisition price, the French-source fraction of the exercise gain, and the beneficiary's length of activity within the company. It must also provide the beneficiary with an individual statement before 1 March of the following year.

This is the most frequent omission: since there is no accounting entry to post, nobody triggers anything, and the reporting obligation falls through the cracks.

The full matter, from eligibility to plan design, from exercising the warrants to valuation, through to the DSN return and the capital increase, is set out in the case study “Rewarding your first employees with BSPCE”.