The government plans to raise the annual budget for uniform invoice lottery prizes by more than 50 percent next year, with the grand cash prize probably to increase from NT$2 million (US$64,800) to NT$10 million, Minister of Finance Lee Sush-der (李述德) said yesterday.
Lee made the remarks during a question-and-answer session, when he briefed the Finance Committee on the general government annual budget proposal for next year, which later passed its first reading and has been referred to the legislature for a second review.
Next year, the ministry intends to allocate NT$7.9 billion for uniform invoice prizes, which would be 3 percent of the total business tax revenue budget for next year, as the Value-added and Non-value-added Business Tax Act (加值型及非加值型營業稅法) stipulates.
That represents a jump of NT$2.64 billion, or 50.14 percent, compared with NT$5.26 billion budgeted for this year, Lee said, adding that the number of sets of winning numbers and the total prize value would be increased next year.
Lee said the increased prize money would serve as an incentive to encourage consumers to make sure they obtain receipts for every purchase they make, which will also help reduce tax evasion and boost tax revenues.
SIZE OF PRIZES
“There are many ways to increase the size of prizes. The grand prize may increase to NT$10 million, NT$20 million or even NT$30 million. We are currently studying all the possibilities and hopefully will make a decision soon,” Lee told the legislature.
Last year, up to 13.57 million uniform invoice lottery tickets were redeemed for a total of NT$4.66 billion in cash prizes. Of the 13.57 million tickets, only 139 tickets were grand prizes, the ministry’s data showed.
In August, the Taxation Agency said that more than 200 millionaires had been created by winning the grand prize of the uniform invoice lottery since two more grand prizes were added in 2008.
Meanwhile, the ministry has also budgeted NT$43 billion to establish an updated electronic invoice integration platform to meet growing demand for such invoices from businesses. Lee said that the new platform is expected to go into service as soon as next year.
China has claimed a breakthrough in developing homegrown chipmaking equipment, an important step in overcoming US sanctions designed to thwart Beijing’s semiconductor goals. State-linked organizations are advised to use a new laser-based immersion lithography machine with a resolution of 65 nanometers or better, the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) said in an announcement this month. Although the note does not specify the supplier, the spec marks a significant step up from the previous most advanced indigenous equipment — developed by Shanghai Micro Electronics Equipment Group Co (SMEE, 上海微電子) — which stood at about 90 nanometers. MIIT’s claimed advances last
ISSUES: Gogoro has been struggling with ballooning losses and was recently embroiled in alleged subsidy fraud, using Chinese-made components instead of locally made parts Gogoro Inc (睿能創意), the nation’s biggest electric scooter maker, yesterday said that its chairman and CEO Horace Luke (陸學森) has resigned amid chronic losses and probes into the company’s alleged involvement in subsidy fraud. The board of directors nominated Reuntex Group (潤泰集團) general counsel Tamon Tseng (曾夢達) as the company’s new chairman, Gogoro said in a statement. Ruentex is Gogoro’s biggest stakeholder. Gogoro Taiwan general manager Henry Chiang (姜家煒) is to serve as acting CEO during the interim period, the statement said. Luke’s departure came as a bombshell yesterday. As a company founder, he has played a key role in pushing for the
EUROPE ON HOLD: Among a flurry of announcements, Intel said it would postpone new factories in Germany and Poland, but remains committed to its US expansion Intel Corp chief executive officer Pat Gelsinger has landed Amazon.com Inc’s Amazon Web Services (AWS) as a customer for the company’s manufacturing business, potentially bringing work to new plants under construction in the US and boosting his efforts to turn around the embattled chipmaker. Intel and AWS are to coinvest in a custom semiconductor for artificial intelligence computing — what is known as a fabric chip — in a “multiyear, multibillion-dollar framework,” Intel said in a statement on Monday. The work would rely on Intel’s 18A process, an advanced chipmaking technology. Intel shares rose more than 8 percent in late trading after the
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) has appointed Rose Castanares, executive vice president of TSMC Arizona, as president of the subsidiary, which is responsible for carrying out massive investments by the Taiwanese tech giant in the US state, the company said in a statement yesterday. Castanares will succeed Brian Harrison as president of the Arizona subsidiary on Oct. 1 after the incumbent president steps down from the position with a transfer to the Arizona CEO office to serve as an advisor to TSMC Arizona’s chairman, the statement said. According to TSMC, Harrison is scheduled to retire on Dec. 31. Castanares joined TSMC in