Tax revenue last month tumbled 72 percent year-on-year to NT$194.1 billion (US$6.11 billion), dragged by the different deadline for filing corporate and personal income taxes last year, the Ministry of Finance said yesterday.
Corporate and personal income tax revenue stood at NT$8 billion and NT$7.8 billion, diving 97.4 percent and 96.4 percent respectively from the levels last year when the government granted a one-month moratorium for income tax declaration to accommodate inconveniences caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, ministry statistics official Liang Kuan-shuan (梁冠璇) told an online news briefing.
“There is no need to worry about the retreats attributable to deadline adjustments,” Liang said.
Photo: Chang Chia-ming, Taipei Times
Tax revenue in the first seven months gained 9.2 percent to a record high of NT$2.29 trillion and ahead of the budget schedule by 15.6 percent, thanks to marked increases in revenue of corporate and personal income, business, stamp, tariff, house and car license taxes, she said.
The uptrend would likely be sustained as the nation’s economy is about to emerge from a slowdown and help energize business activity, Liang said, adding that the state coffers would also receive a boost from higher property and house taxes.
Securities transaction tax revenue, the main drag last year due to a bear market, spiked 57.1 percent to NT$22.3 billion, as the local bourse benefited from the global artificial intelligence boom.
Prices of local shares involved in supply of artificial intelligence hardware devices have more than doubled in recent months, Taiwan Stock Exchange data showed.
Daily stock turnover soared 69.3 percent year-on-year to NT$459.2 billion last month and has hovered at about similar levels so far this month, Liang said, adding that securities transaction tax revenue would beat the budget target by a big margin if that momentum sustains for the rest of this year.
Land value incremental tax revenue, a major gauge of property transactions, amounted to NT$6.9 billion, rising 7.6 percent from a year earlier, the ministry said.
Liang refrained from interpreting the increase as a recovery in the property market, saying longer observation would be necessary as the government has introduced a series of measures to curb property price hikes.
ENERGY ISSUES: The TSIA urged the government to increase natural gas and helium reserves to reduce the impact of the Middle East war on semiconductor supply stability Chip testing and packaging service provider ASE Technology Holding Co (日月光投控) yesterday said it planned to invest more than NT$100 billion (US$3.15 billion) in building a new advanced chip testing facility in Kaohsiung to keep up with customer demand driven by the artificial intelligence (AI) boom. That would be included in the company’s capital expenditure budget next year, ASE said. There is also room to raise this year’s capital spending budget from a record-high US$7 billion estimated three months ago, it added. ASE would have six factories under construction this year, another record-breaking number, ASE chief operating officer Tien Wu
The EU and US are nearing an agreement to coordinate on producing and securing critical minerals, part of a push to break reliance on Chinese supplies. The potential deal would create incentives, such as minimum prices, that could advantage non-Chinese suppliers, according to a draft of an “action plan” seen by Bloomberg. The EU and US would also cooperate on standards, investments and joint projects, as well as coordinate on any supply disruptions by countries like China. The two sides are additionally seeking other “like-minded partners” to join a multicountry accord to help create these new critical mineral supply chains, which feed into
For weeks now, the global tech industry has been waiting for a major artificial intelligence (AI) launch from DeepSeek (深度求索), seen as a benchmark for China’s progress in the fast-moving field. More than a year has passed since the start-up put Chinese AI on the map in early last year with a low-cost chatbot that performed at a similar level to US rivals. However, despite reports and rumors about its imminent release, DeepSeek’s next-generation “V4” model is nowhere in sight. Speculation is also swirling over the geopolitical implications of which computer chips were chosen to train and power the new
TECH WINNERS: Taiwan and South Korea reported robust trade, which suggests that they have critical advantages in the rapidly expanding AI supply chain, an official said Exports last month surged to a new high, as booming demand tied to artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure fueled shipments of advanced technology components, underscoring the nation’s pivotal role in the global semiconductor supply chain. Outbound shipments climbed to US$80.18 billion, the highest ever for a single month, rising 61.8 percent from a year earlier and marking the 29th consecutive month of growth, the Ministry of Finance said yesterday. “The surge was driven primarily by global investment in AI infrastructure,” Department of Statistics Director-General Beatrice Tsai (蔡美娜) said. The mass production of next-generation AI computing systems has accelerated procurement across the semiconductor supply
RSS