1/4% Tax on all stock trades pushed in NY Times today

Quote from MrPowerBallad:

And the beat goes on . . .

<i>France and Germany Push for Transaction Tax
Published: July 9 2010 15:18

Germany and France are pressing ahead with their plan for a tax on financial transactions in the European Union by raising the issue for discussion at the bloc’s next meeting of finance ministers early next week. </i>

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/e64dd66c-8b49-11df-a4b4-00144feab49a.html

"German officials concede that the fate of the tax lies largely in the hands of the UK government, which is expected to protect the interests of the City of London as Europe’s premier financial centre."

I just don't see the UK going along with this. Hopefully they firmly say no and the FTT finally dies once and for all...

-Guru
 
Quote from listedguru:

"German officials concede that the fate of the tax lies largely in the hands of the UK government, which is expected to protect the interests of the City of London as Europe’s premier financial centre."

I just don't see the UK going along with this. Hopefully they firmly say no and the FTT finally dies once and for all...

-Guru

Until the Obama tax committee finishes their work Dec 1.
 
Quote from Midas:

Until the Obama tax committee finishes their work Dec 1.



A FTT recommendation will never make it out of the Obama deficit commission panel, nor will any tax increase idea. Of course, we all know that the FTT will be brought up, especially with union assholes like Andy Stern on the panel. But it would take at least 2 Republicans on the panel to vote yes for any recommendation to be forwarded to Congress for a vote. The GOP members on this panel have already stated that they will oppose any tax increase ideas. Obama only created this panel for political cover, and that we shouldn't expect any type of new tax ideas to get the approval necessary for Congress to take it up. Then again, Congress doesn't need the panel's approval to take up any tax increase proposals. Something to watch for would be the Congressional "lame duck" session which takes place after the Nov. elections. It's already being reported that the Democrats, who expect to take a royal ass kicking on Nov. 2nd, will try to hurry before the new Congress is sworn in and pass many controversial bills like Cap & Trade, Immigration Reform, etc.... I certainly wouldn't rule out a FTT either, although it's unlikely, as the Republicans can still filibuster any of these bills, meaning it would take 60 votes in the Senate to pass anything. If we can make it to Jan. 2011 without a FTT being voted on, or passed, we'll be just fine.



http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&sour...UxdggRgAhjhfsRBCQ&sig2=SdnafPdoA3E5jJVy-Qy12A
 
Quote from rc8222:

A FTT recommendation will never make it out of the Obama deficit commission panel, nor will any tax increase idea. Of course, we all know that the FTT will be brought up, especially with union assholes like Andy Stern on the panel. But it would take at least 2 Republicans on the panel to vote yes for any recommendation to be forwarded to Congress for a vote. The GOP members on this panel have already stated that they will oppose any tax increase ideas. Obama only created this panel for political cover, and that we shouldn't expect any type of new tax ideas to get the approval necessary for Congress to take it up. Then again, Congress doesn't need the panel's approval to take up any tax increase proposals. Something to watch for would be the Congressional "lame duck" session which takes place after the Nov. elections. It's already being reported that the Democrats, who expect to take a royal ass kicking on Nov. 2nd, will try to hurry before the new Congress is sworn in and pass many controversial bills like Cap & Trade, Immigration Reform, etc.... I certainly wouldn't rule out a FTT either, although it's unlikely, as the Republicans can still filibuster any of these bills, meaning it would take 60 votes in the Senate to pass anything. If we can make it to Jan. 2011 without a FTT being voted on, or passed, we'll be just fine.



http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&sour...UxdggRgAhjhfsRBCQ&sig2=SdnafPdoA3E5jJVy-Qy12A

I fully agree. It's highly unlikely that an FTT will make it out of this deficit commission. But if by some off chance it did it would definately be shot down in the Senate. There are a few (maybe a handful) of dems in the Senate who will not support a FTT proposal.

November can't come soon enough,

-Guru
 
Quote from listedguru:

I fully agree. It's highly unlikely that an FTT will make it out of this deficit commission. But if by some off chance it did it would definately be shot down in the Senate. There are a few (maybe a handful) of dems in the Senate who will not support a FTT proposal.

November can't come soon enough,

-Guru

The problem is the package is supposed to be voted on as one unit, without any modifications. If so, a PR campaign to fix the deficit could ram it through. We've always mentioned a possible passage of this tax could come via linkage to another bill. Should the concept of voting on the commission results without modification comes to pass, there's reason to be concerned.
 
Quote from seasideheights:

The problem is the package is supposed to be voted on as one unit, without any modifications. If so, a PR campaign to fix the deficit could ram it through. We've always mentioned a possible passage of this tax could come via linkage to another bill. Should the concept of voting on the commission results without modification comes to pass, there's reason to be concerned.

This so called package would still need to get 60 votes in the Senate though. I'm sure the commission as a whole knows that any package with a FTT in it won't garner the necessary 60 votes in the Senate so therefore I don't think they would present a package containing a FTT to be voted on (unless their ultimate goal is failure to pass so they can pass blame on the Senate, which may be the case).

Either way I'm confident a FTT isn't going to happen...

-Guru
 
EU commissioner rebuffs quick introduction of transaction tax

http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/news/334309,rebuffs-quick-transaction-tax.html

Frankfurt/Brussels - The European Union's taxation commissioner has cautioned against the rapid introduction of a financial transaction tax, in comments made to the German daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung for its Monday edition.

Algirdas Semeta's comments come on the heels of the release Friday of a letter by German and French finance ministers Wolfgang Schaeuble and Christine Lagarde calling on the EU to proceed with plans to introduce the tax.

"It is easy to issue such demands," Algirdas Semeta said.

"But the commission has to make sure that we don't make absurd decisions. If the tax doesn't subsequently work, we will be the culprits," the Lithuanian commissioner said.

Semeta added that he is currently looking into whether the tax would even make sense.

"The competitiveness of the European financial centres can not suffer," he warned.

Supporters say a transaction tax is needed to make the financial sector pay for the crisis it created and provide much needed cash to debt-ridden governments.

But the Group of 20 (G20) leading developed and developing economies last month rejected the idea on a worldwide basis.

Schaeuble and Lagarde asked in the letter - addressed to Belgian Finance Minister Didier Reynders, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency - that space be reserved for the tax to be discussed at an informal gathering of EU finance ministers in September.
 
Quote from Explorer:"the commission has to make sure that we don't make absurd decisions.
Good to see the European Sir Humphrey on our side (perhaps unsurprisingly, see e.g. http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&postid=2755403&highlight=Semeta#post2755403 ). It will be much easier for him to oppose the FTT on grounds of easy circumvention now that the rest of the world has already rejected the idea. But perhaps Mr Quant can re-use some of the old arguments, cited in September 2009 by his predecessor, Commissioner Kovacs (http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&postid=2726020&highlight=Commissioner#post2726020).

Reason and experience will eventually prevail and political advisors will be soon sent packing (or even better: dispatched on an urgent independent fact-finding mission to some exotic destination, as in one of the installments of 'Yes Minister' (http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b009v0dc AND the pirated version;) http://abmp3.com/mp3/yes-minister.html ).
 
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