posted October 04, 2016 at 11:30 pm by Jenniffer B. Austria [ thestandard.com.ph
]
The Securities and Exchange Commission
is ready to submit a proposal to the Finance Department that will reduce the
minimum public float requirement on real estate investment trust companies to
30 percent to attract potential Reit issuers.
“We are already finished with the study
and we’ll propose a lower minimum public
ownership requirement, and maybe just reserve the right to increase it when the
markets are okay,” SEC chair Teresita Herbosa said in an interview the
sidelines of a forum held in Shangri-la at the Fort hotel.
Herbosa said the minimum public
ownership for REIT could be subject to review by the SEC after five years.
Aside from the minimum public ownership,
Herbosa said the government should also address another important concern of
potential Reit issuers—the imposition of a value added on the transfer of
assets to Reit companies.
The SEC plans to address the concern to
the Bureau of Internal Revenue.
Herbosa said the Finance Department had
asked the regulator to start reviewing the corporate taxes on capital markets,
including the initial public offering and the stock transaction taxes.
Herbosa is amendable to removing the IPO
tax but she hinted the need to increase the stock transaction tax.
“Personally, I don’t have any objection
to that (removal of IPO tax) because I was told that we’re the only country
with IPO tax. But we have to increase stock transaction tax. So maybe if we
increase the minimum public ownership, we will also bat for maybe a little
higher stock transaction tax,” Herbosa said.
Sale of shares listed in and sold
through the Philippine Stock Exchange are subject to a stock transaction tax at
a rate of 1/2 of 1 percent of the total gross selling price.
The review of the corporate taxes on
capital markets will be undertaken by SEC together with the Financial Executive
of the Philippines and Capital Markets Development Council.
“The tax reform that we are trying to
see is where we probably (can) help people get into business, save money. But
at the same time, we need to see if there is enough revenues for government
undertaking the infra projects during this golden age of infrastructure,”
Herbosa said.
Meanwhile, the SEC is now reviewing two
new products that will boost the domestic capital markets.
These are the dollar-denominated
securities and the rules on public private partnership listing, which will pave
the way for listing of PPP companies in the stock exchange.
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