Prosperity tax expected to bring in at least RM3b - deputy minister

 

PARLIAMENT | The one-off prosperity tax announced in Budget 2022 is estimated to bring in at least RM3 billion in revenue for the government, said Finance Deputy Minister II Yamani Hafez Musa.

“We are not sure but we estimate that we can get at least RM3 billion and above,” he said.

The Sipitang MP was responding to a question from Ahmad Maslan (BN-Pontian) about how much revenue the prosperity tax is expected to bring in during the question-and-answer session in the Dewan Rakyat today.

Under Budget 2022, big companies with paid-up capital of RM2.5 million or more will have the corporate tax on taxable income for the first RM100 million maintained at 24 percent.

However, any taxable income after RM100 million will be subjected to the one-off 33 percent prosperity tax.

Yamani (above) explained that this prosperity tax was a result of feedback from many parties who wanted companies whose revenue was unaffected by the pandemic to contribute to the economy’s recovery.

“It is on a one-off basis and we feel it is quite reasonable, seeing that the companies were still earning such high income in the past one or two years.

“We feel it is being implemented fairly and it is not targeted at any particular industry or sector only,” he said.

This was in response to Nga Kor Ming (Harapan-Teluk Intan) who had questioned what the government intends to do about the drastic drop in Bursa Malaysia after the announcement of the prosperity tax.

Good prices

Yamani acknowledged that the Bursa’s sharp decline could be a sign that many are concerned about the prosperity tax.

However, he said many analysts have said this could be due to short-term “market players” who have pulled out en masse.

“If we give it a few days, this could give space to those who want to make long-term investments to get good prices for the existing shares right now,” he said.

On a separate issue, Yamani, who was among those named in the Pandora Papers leak, clarified that the company he was linked to is no longer active and that the taxes have been paid.

The Pandora Papers are a trove of more than 11.9 million documents provided to the International Consortium of Investigative Journalism, who shared access to collaborators, including Malaysiakini.

The data is a leak from 14 service providers who assist individuals and businesses with setting up offshore entities in tax havens. - Mkini