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

[listedguru]

Quote from justrading:

Quote from article:

"Under the European Commission's proposed financial transaction tax, bonds, derivatives and shares would all be taxed, with the banks that handle the transaction having to pay rather than the investor. For a factbox on how it could work click on"

Saying it's only the banks is a new slant?

No banks involved in any of my trades.

Yeah it mentions that the stamp duty taxes only shares and falls on the investor but the ftt is paid by banks. I sure wish we could get some good honest reporting on the issue. The public is getting duped on this majorly.

Also when they mention a stamp duty for the entire EU would this be a new stamp duty for the UK on top of their existing one? Or would the other EU members just sign on to what the Brits already have?

Either way it's a bad idea as even an EU wide stamp duty is a stepping stone to an full blown ftt in the future. Surely the Brits must now this?

-Guru

 

[bjw]

Quote from listedguru:



Either way it's a bad idea as even an EU wide stamp duty is a stepping stone to an full blown ftt in the future. Surely the Brits must now this?

-Guru

who cares if it's a stepping stone to something else, an eu wide stamp duty would be a disaster in itself. for me this would be just as bad as a full-blown ftt, because both kill off any trading i do.
again, i admire the brits for their stance in this, but their own stupid stamp tax kills trading in stocks just as much as an ftt does.

edit: let me reprhrase: the advantage of the uk stamp tax is it only applies to uk trading and in that sense it's better than an ftt. having become familiar with the EU way of thinking they will want a stamp tax based on residency though.

 

[Rantany]

Quote from justrading:

Quote from article:

"Under the European Commission's proposed financial transaction tax, bonds, derivatives and shares would all be taxed, with the banks that handle the transaction having to pay rather than the investor. For a factbox on how it could work click on"

Saying it's only the banks is a new slant?

No banks involved in any of my trades.

I guess they think that this transaction tax is so tiny, that a 'normal' investor wouldn't suffer any mentionable losses with paying this tax.

 

[Explorer]

Quote from listedguru:

Yeah it mentions that the stamp duty taxes only shares and falls on the investor but the ftt is paid by banks. I sure wish we could get some good honest reporting on the issue. The public is getting duped on this majorly.

Also when they mention a stamp duty for the entire EU would this be a new stamp duty for the UK on top of their existing one? Or would the other EU members just sign on to what the Brits already have?

Either way it's a bad idea as even an EU wide stamp duty is a stepping stone to an full blown ftt in the future. Surely the Brits must now this?

-Guru

There are two things here - firstly the detail of any proposal from Germany/Brussels- i.e the scope and rate of tax, and secondly, and WAY more importantly, who will decide UK tax policy in the future.

So even if Germany could find a scope and level of stamp duty acceptable to Britain (unlikely anyway) there's no way on earth the UK would sign up to any agreement whereby furture tax laws would be written by Brussels not London. Not a chance!

 

[tomdavis]

Quote from Rantany:

I guess they think that this transaction tax is so tiny, that a 'normal' investor wouldn't suffer any mentionable losses with paying this tax.

Never forget what EU Tax Commissioner Algirdas Semeta said about the tax rate-setting strategy: "The moment in which we introduce a tax on financial transactions, of course, everything looks different. Then we can also raise the tax rates."

 

[Explorer]

It seems Merkel has started to see the writing on the wall now. An EU27 FTT is already as dead as a G20 FTT. There isn't going to be enough support for an EZ17 FTT either (it would't surprise me if Merkozy would actually be embarassed by a vote on the subject now).

So Merkel is in retreat and considering "compromise" offers to London which London has no reason to consider.

If plans for a European FTT do actually die this quarter, perhaps a few FTT enthusiast countries - France, Germany, Belgium, Austria, for example - might come up with stamp duty type taxes of their own.

If so it would a great time for the UK to repeal theirs. Before 2008 there was some pressure to repeal it as the £3bn or so tax revenue was though insufficient to compensate for the LSE being uncompetitive with US stock exchanges.

 

[tomdavis]

From Malta:

http://www.timesofmalta.com/article...residency-has-no-high-hopes-on-new-tax.401959

EU presidency has no high hopes on new tax

“In reality, no one wants this tax apart from France,” a senior official from the Danish Economic Affairs Ministry said.

 

[FightTheFuture]

"Berlin has called for a quick decision on the European Commission’s proposal for a tax on financial transactions in the EU – not excluding the possibility, if this path is abandoned, of exploring the British model of taxing the stock market.

“We want to know quickly, as soon as possible, at the latest by the end of the first quarter...

http://www.europolitics.info/econom...ancial-tax-call-from-berlin-art323923-30.html

 

[Rantany]

If Rösler doesn't watch out, he might get both the FTT and the Stamp Duty as a bonus

 

[Robert A. Green]

FTT seems to be crumbling before our eyes. How can just a few countries pass it on their own, as that is against the spirit of an EU-wide, or at least euro zone-wide initiative? It's supposed to be a minimum of 9 or more countries in the EU that passes a new tax policy initiative, and FTT may have less than 9 EU or euro zone countries in support.

Let's not lose sight of the role that FTT was destined to play in the bigger-picture events of EU and their bailouts. FTT was chosen as the first EU tax initiative in support of the new EU fiscal compact. The UK objected to the fiscal compact over the FTT proposal and more, putting the EU-fiscal-union drive into neutral and disarray.

The EU leaders including Merkel and Sarkozy want to go back into drive and they need a coordinated new EU-wide tax agreed-to, along with the UK signing a new fiscal compact. Sarkozy probably needs this fast, before his re-election in May.

So, these leaders appear to be floating a trial balloon to downsize their FTT into a UK-style stamp duty tax. Will that be enough to get the UK to sign the fiscal compact, which is France and Germany's main goal? Then they can claim victory on a new EU-wide tax on transactions and a successfully-agreed to EU-wide fiscal compact. Back on their way and with growing influence in Brussels.

But, stamp duty is terrible for traders, who will be snagged with it in most cases, right? So, we need to tell the UK to scrap their stamp duty tax, as they recently considered, and to continue with their no vote on the fiscal compact. There we other issues of financial-market sovereignty too, like EU-wide Brussels-center regulations that the UK objected to. Plus, Sweden probably won't want a stamp duty tax either. All those that said, they would go along if it’s EU-wide may be called on their bluff now and that’s not good.

We need to call stamp duty a Trojan-Horse for FTT, and a bad idea on its own anyway. And, show all the holes in the stamp duty tax in the UK. Let’s revisit and bring back that content from before.

FTT was a horrible tax, but a real long-shot. Stamp duty may be a little less horrible, but horrible enough for traders, and it may not be as much of a long-shot, so we may be worse off here.

At least we know that Obama and Geithner are against Main Street investors paying a transaction tax and that's the essence of stamp duty.

How can a government charge to stamp traders' shares, when they fly in and out so fast, they can't even stamp them. That's taxation without representation, archaic, and unjustified.