Limassol - Value Added Tax (VAT) is Cyprus' single most important source of public revenue, Minister of Finance, Harris Georgiades, revealed in his opening address at the first-of-its-kind Limassol VAT Forum, last week... Read Full Article »
Cyprus is the third largest island in the Mediterranean, situated in the eastern corner of the Mediterranean Sea. It lies at the crossroads of Europe, Asia and Africa, close to the busy shipping and air routes linking Europe with the Arab World... Read Full Article »
Value Added Tax (VAT) is that elusive little percentage that creeps up and settles at the bottom of invoices or requests for payment, many times over and above the final price that has been agreed. Read Full Article »
China announced a further package of tax cuts to benefit SMEs, extending previous reductions in income tax and VAT exemptions. That's presumably good news for would-be businesspeople, although it's difficult to tell from a distance how far Chinese entrepreneurs are tormented by bureaucrats, as is the case for small businesses in Europe and America Read Full Article »
Spain's Rajoy has promised income tax cuts in 2015, so half a cheer for him for at least talking the talk. But will he walk the walk? Perhaps more credibly, the Finance Minister would only say that he is not planning a VAT rise "for now." If they weren't politicians, they wouldn't even begin to consider lowering taxes at this moment in history: the deficit for 2013 was probably just over 6 percent, while debt was 84 percent of GDP in 2013 and is expected to rise to 94 percent in 2014. While these figures aren't as catastrophic as those for Greece (and Italy's debt stands at 135 percent of GDP and rising), they are quite frightening. What they ought to do, of course, is to cut public spending, even though that would increase already massive unemployment (26 percent). Read Full Article »
It's Christmas week, isn't it, so obviously lots of governments will be making goodwill gestures to their stressed-out, over-taxed citizens, to show how grateful they are for the tax money that pays for their big, black cars, the trips to G3, G5, G8, G20, G30 junkets in beautiful places with long-legged personal assistants and the rest. Well, let's see: Mexico is increasing the scope of VAT and has gone back on some promised tax reductions; Max Baucus wants to reduce energy tax incentives (increase taxes, in other words and am I seeing things, or does he have a double who's going to be the Ambassador to China that definitely proves that the President has gone off the TPP); community taxes are increasing right across Belgium; and France (that traditional home of Christmas bonhomie) is going to scale back the Read Full Article »
With the demise of Greece, the interwoven Cyprus economy has taken a beating. Following the footsteps of other Euro members, the Cypriot government has asked the EU for a bailout. Of course it would be foolish for them not to try, since the European Commission seems so keen in handing out billions of Euro's. Read Full Article »
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