In late August, Hurricane/Tropical Storm Irene ripped through much of the East Coast leaving a wake of storm and flood damage. Parts of North Carolina, Maryland, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont and Puerto Rico have been declared federal disaster areas by the president. The specific counties of each state and territory that have been declared federal disaster areas are available here ...
On Tuesday, February 21, 2023, Decree Nº318/2022 of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was published in the Official Gazette, enacting the "Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership" (CPTPP), which has entered into force as of that date. The treaty seeks to promote the economic integration of the parties, generating a common framework for trade policy, government procurement, intellectual property, electronic commerce, investment, among others ...
The South African tax provisions applicable to real estate investment trusts (“REITs”) were introduced by way of the insertion of section 25BB of the Income Tax Act, 1962 (the “Act”), as well as consequential insertions in various sections of the Act during 2013. These provisions relating to REITs have been subject to various changes and refinements over time in order to resolve various issues and legislative anomalies ...
Through the Decree 474 of 2020, the Ministry of Culture regulates Article 178 of Law 1955, 2019 (National Development Plan 2018-2022) regarding the issuance of Audiovisual Investment Certificates in Colombia (the “Certificates”). The Certificates are tradable securities issued by the Ministry of Culture to producers that develop audiovisual compositions within the territory and that are not required to file an income tax return in Colombia ...
In order to comply with the international guidelines regarding corporate transparency, the government of Panama enacted Law 52 of October 27, 2016 in the Official Gazette. This Law establishes the obligation for Panamanian companies and other entities to maintain accounting records, financial records and supporting documentation of all transactions that took place during the last five (5) years, so that their financial status can be easily determined with reasonable accuracy ...
Powers to legislate on tax matters are delegated to the executive branch regarding COVID-19.- Law No. 31011 approved the delegation of powers to the executive branch for a period of 45 calendar days to legislate on the following tax matters: i) Temporary suspension of existing fiscal rules and establishment of measures for the national economic recovery. ii) Payment facilities for tax liabilities administered by SUNAT ...
In order to provide clarity regarding the tax obligations of financial technology providers and users in Indonesia, Indonesia’s Minister of Finance (“MOF”) issued MOF Regulation No. 69/PMK.03/2022 on the Income Tax and Value Added Tax on the Organization of Financial Technology (“MOF Reg 69/2022”) on 30 March 2022, which came into force on 1 May 2022 ...
Law No. 21.398 "Pro-Consumer", which was published on December 24th, 2021, incorporated the current Article 17 N of the Consumer Protection Act. This article establishes that, before entering a credit transaction, suppliers must analyze the economic solvency of the consumer in order to comply with the obligations arising therefrom ...
After lengthy discussions among regulators and politicians on ownership of commercial banks, Bank Indonesia issued its Regulation No. 14/8/PBI/2012 regarding Ownership of Shares in Commercial Banks (“BI Regulation No. 14”) which came into effect on 13 July 2012.In general, BI Regulation No. 14 provides rules that restrict ownership of commercial banks by individuals or corporations either on an individual or joint basis. BI Regulation No ...
Through National Executive Branch Decree No. 1034/2020, published in the Official Gazette on December 21, 2020: (i) Regulations of Law No. 27,506 and its amendments -also known as “Knowledge Economy Promotion Regime” (hereinafter, the “Regime” or the “Law”)- were approved; and (ii) the export duties applicable to the provision of services included in subparagraph c), of paragraph 2, of section 10 of Law No ...
The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) recently launched a consultation on its proposed guidance on cryptoassets (CP19/3) which can be read in fullhere. The move comes as part of the UK Cryptoasset Taskforce's wider look into the regulation of the cryptoasset market. The consultation follows a report published in October 2018 by the Taskforce, which consists of the Bank of England, HM Treasury and the FCA. Our discussion of that report can be readhere ...
The SEC has published its final rule for the modernization of share repurchase disclosures. The final rule will require additional details of an issuer’s share repurchase activity. Unlike the previous requirements for share repurchase reporting, the final rule will require daily repurchase data, reported either quarterly or semi-annually, and eliminates the previous requirement for the publication of an issuer’s repurchase data by month in its 10-Qs and 10-Ks ...
The Serbian Minister of Finance issued the Rulebook on the Manner and Procedure of Delivering and the Content of the Tax Administration's Notification on Commencement or Finalization of Tax Audit ("Rulebook"). Under the Rulebook, the Tax Administration ("TA") will start to deliver notifications on initiated tax audits of the legal entities and entrepreneurs to the Business Registers Agency ("BRA"). Notifications will be delivered once a day ...
In March 2022, the Economic Crime (Transparency and Enforcement) Act (“ECA”) was enacted and with it came the creation of a Register of Overseas Entities. Enforceable since January 2023, the register, which includes information about beneficial owners of property or land, attracts a financial penalty of up to £2,500 a day for those that did not submit information before the deadline of 31 January 2023 ...
On 15 November 2020, leaders of the ASEAN Member States, Australia, China, Japan, Republic of Korea and New Zealand witnessed the signing of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (“RCEP“) Agreement. The RCEP Agreement marks ASEAN’s biggest free trade pact to date, covering a market of 2.2 billion people with a combined size of US$26.2 trillion ...
In order to create a more uniform system for the administration of taxes in South Africa, section 191 of the Tax Administration Act, 2011 (the “TAA”) has effectively replaced various refund and set-off provisions which appeared in respective tax acts. Section 191 of the TAA now provides that all tax debts that are due must be set-off against refunds, including the interest thereon, due by the South African Revenue Service (“SARS”) to that taxpayer ...
My time is short, so let me get to my subject without delay.I begin with a few observations on the Reality we face.First, the bad news - not all of it, just some of it; just four things that I regard as being among the more worrisome realities that confront us today.Firstly, in terms of aggregate dollar volume, we are a much smaller industry now than we were just a few years ago ...
Neutrality is a basic concept in tax policy which establishes that a tax system should not interfere in the decision-making process, so that the decision should be taken based on its economic merits and not in its tax implications. Of course, this is not an absolute principle because it is understood that absolute neutrality is impossible to achieve ...
Many countries have become more focused on combating tax avoidance. As such, transfer pricing compliance has become much more burdensome due to substantial documentation requirements and multiple filing deadlines. Multinationals (“MNEs”) have to take action to control their transfer pricing risks, but the cost of doing so could substantially increase ...
HM Treasury’s decision to hold a “Tax Day” today will be a bellwether for long-term changes in government tax policy. Traditionally these announcements would have been made alongside the Budget, but this year the Treasury has decided to announce some extra tax rule changes separately. In our previous insight we highlighted an “amber” tax alert for couples contemplating divorce or separation ...
In our November 2006 Asia IP Bulletin, we reported on a ground-breaking agreement (the "Agreement") signed by the Hong Kong and Mainland Chinese Governments, under which they agreed to recognise and enforce judgments made in each others courts. The Agreement followed four years of discussion and legislative changes are now underway in Hong Kong to implement the Agreement ...
Serbia Following the last amendments to the tax laws, the Ministry of Finance has since prepared several rulebooks to help implement the amended legal provisions. Amongst these, the Rulebook on Transfer Pricing is the most important. Other rulebooks of the Ministry prescribe new forms of tax returns for tax payable on capital gains and income from the lease of movable and immovable assets, and newly introduced withholding tax on income from the sale of scrap and waste ...
With two Congressional Decrees approved in February and March 2012 (“Ley Antievasión II” (Decree 4-2012), and “Ley de Actualización Tribuaria” (Decree 10-2012) respectively), Congress introduces several reforms to the Guatemalan Tax System through extensive amendments to the Tax Code (“Código Tributario”) and other tax laws. The most notorious and substantial reforms affect the VAT Law, the Tobacco Tax Law, the Tax Code, and Income Tax Law ...
On 30 May 2020, the Abu Dhabi Media Office posted through Twitter that the Department of Government Support has eased restrictions on some activities and issued a set of guidelines for working from and visiting government entities in Abu Dhabi. The guidelines below come into effect from today, 1 June 2020, and are limited to individuals between the ages of 12 and 60 ...
