The finance ministry is reportedly ready to proceed with a tax regime aimed at the assets of so-called Undertakings for Collective Investment in Transferable Securities (UCITS) investment groups, as they are known in Greece, to the tune of 0.05 percent on an annual basis.
Additionally, in a bid to find more revenue to meet memorandum-mandated fiscal targets through 2018, the bill also foresees a 0.35-percent tax on bond mutual funds; a 0.5-percent tax on mixed asset mutual funds, while stock mutual funds will be slapped with a 0.75-percent tax on assets, according to sources quoted by “N”. The highest tax rate, 0.75 percent, will also apply to closed investment company / mutual funds and the increasingly dynamic real estate investment companies
Total capital and assets affected by the new tax regime is estimated at seven billion euros.
“This is an unprecedented decision, one that lacks any reasonably argument; it is a Greek peculiarity (compared with the international norm) and it will have only one certain result: it will open the door for the transfer overseas from recession-plagued Greece of an entire (financial sector),” UCITS officials warned.
The government, according to the same reports, will debut the new taxes in an amendment to an upcoming draft bill liberalizing the framework for non-performing loans and establishing automatic spending cut mechanism, the so-called “cutter” mechanism.
