Tax revenues this year are expected to surpass the government's target by more than NT$120 billion (US$3.7 billion) to reach NT$1.6 trillion, a Ministry of Finance official said yesterday.
The NT$120 billion excess is the second highest excess on record, Lee Li-shu (
The excess last year was NT$140 billion.
The ministry attributed the forecasted 8 percent surplus on the official target to better than expected economic performance and a slew of new provisions to reduce tax evasions, Lee said at a press briefing.
Last month the treasury took in NT$147.9 billion in tax revenues, up 0.9 percent on a year ago, according to the ministry tally.
The biggest increase came from land tax revenues, including land value incremental tax, which rose 6.5 percent from last year to a record NT$40.8 billion, the tally showed.
Revenues from the securities transaction tax jumped 38.3 percent to reach NT$8.2 billion as international capital flowed into Asian markets, boosting transactions on the TAIEX, Lee said.
For the first 11 months of the year, taxation totaled NT$1.51 trillion, up 2.2 percent year-on-year, the ministry tally showed.
As the figure represents 102.9 percent of the target set for the whole year, Lee estimated that tax revenues this year were likely to exceed the government-set target by 8 percent.
The biggest increase for the 11 months to Nov. 30 was recorded in the securities transaction tax, which rose by 35.8 percent to NT$80.5 billion. Commodity tax revenues dropped 6.4 percent to NT$145.6 billion due to sluggish auto sales, she said.
On Thursday, the ministry slashed the government's budget deficit forecast this year by nearly 80 percent on the back of rising tax revenues and declining expenditures.
The budget deficit would reach around NT$50 billion this year, down from the previous forecast of NT$239 billion, the ministry estimated.
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