DSE wants 6 benefits from govt

The Dhaka Stock Exchange has demanded six benefits from the government to make the stock market more developed and dynamic.

DSE Chairman Eunusur Rahman made the demands at a post-budget press conference at the DSE Tower’s media centre in the capital on Monday.

The DSE chairman said the size of the corporate bond market in Bangladesh is very small at present. “We believe the country’s stock market and the economy as a whole will benefit if an effective bond market is created through timely policy support.”

For that, the interest earned on all types of corporate bonds like zero-coupon bonds should be kept tax-free regardless of the investor.

Regarding the corporate tax rate, he said that in the proposed budget for fiscal 2022-23 the finance minister reduced the corporate tax rate by 2.5 percentage point, which is a very timely step.

For the sustainable expansion of the stock market, he proposed to keep the tax rate gap between listed and unlisted companies to a minimum of 10 percent.

In order to attract long-term investors in the stock market, the DSE proposed to increase the tax-free dividend limit from Tk 50,000 to a minimum of Tk 1,00,000.

Besides, Rahman demanded that the tax at source from dividends should be considered as the final tax.

The DSE also demanded a reduction in the tax rates of companies listed on the SME board. The board demanded a reduced tax rate of 10 percent for a minimum of five years to keep companies interested.

The DSE chairman said companies pay dividends from after-tax profits. Taxes on dividend income are actually double taxes. Therefore, he proposed to reduce the tax on dividend income of corporate shareholders from 20 percent to 10 percent.

At the same time, in the case of corporate taxpayers, he demanded a final tax rate of 10 percent on dividend income.

In addition, it was demanded to reduce the advance income tax on securities transactions from 0.05 percent to 0.015 percent by exempting the existing unreasonable policy to establish the brokerage house in a fair position. Earlier it was 0.0125 percent.

Otherwise, according to the Income-tax Ordinance, he demanded that effective measures be taken for the purpose of issuing and implementing the order to pay income-tax at the regular rate.