Yukawa alignment in the two-Higgs-doublet model

In multi-Higgs-doublet models the alignment in flavor space of the relevant Yukawa matrices guarantees the absence of tree-level flavor-changing couplings of the neutral scalar fields. We analyze the consequences of this condition within the two-Higgs-doublet model and show that it leads to a generic Yukawa structure which contains as particular cases all known specific implementations of the model based on Z₂ symmetries. All possible freedom in the Yukawa sector gets parametrized in terms of three complex couplings f. In spite of having flavor conservation in the neutral scalar couplings, the phases of these three parameters represent potential new sources of $CP$ violation.