Finance Minister Zbyněk Stanjura has a problem. According to data from the Czech National Bank, the profit of banks and savings banks in the first quarter of this year fell by approximately CZK 2.4 billion year-on-year to approximately CZK 21 billion. But the profits of the banks were supposed to be another source of money to plug holes in the state budget. Thanks to the introduction of the so-called windfall tax, the state coffers should have improved by CZK 33 billion. Now, however, it looks like it will only be a matter of billions of CZK.
Hans Štembera
Description: Minister of Finance Zbyněk Stanjura
“From the announced extraordinary tax levies, it can be judged that the state will collect less than previously expected. While the state previously hoped to collect 33 billion crowns from the banking sector alone, now I expect that the total levy of the banks will be in the order of lower units of billions,” said the analyst of the investment company XTB Tomáš Cverna in an interview with CNN Prima News.
The newly published numbers were also commented on by the chairman of Svobodné Libor Vondráček, for whom the data only adds to his earlier words. “Much less will be collected from the so-called windfall tax than the government led by the Minister of Finance originally expected. Even the finance minister admits it today. It was we, Svobodní, who drew attention to this fact from the very beginning and repeatedly. The tax on extraordinary profits is not only unfair, because the individual sectors it affects were often chosen at random, but at the same time it was obvious in advance that it would not fill the coffers. Higher taxes, especially at extreme tax rates, do not mean higher collection. Our words have been confirmed in this,” stated Libor Vondráček.
“We would like the Minister of Finance to finally understand this. Now he has concrete data for this, which speaks clearly. Almost nothing will be collected from this special tax,” added Chairman Vondráček, adding that Svobodní have better ideas on how to balance the budget. “And we repeat them over and over again. Canceling subsidies and the state agenda must be the first step,” he appealed.
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author: Karel Excellent
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2023-07-12 19:07:00
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