CAPITAL LEVY.

Wairarapa Age, 21 October 1937, Page 5

CAPITAL LEVY.

IMPOSED BY THE ITALIAN CABINET. UNPRECEDENTED MEASURE. BAIT OFFERED TO FOREIGN INVESTORS. ROME., October 19. Cabinet has imposed an extraordinary levy of 10 per cent, on the capital and stock of all Italian companies. A capital levy is unprecedented in Italy. Cabinet has also increased the duty on estate and ordinary business transactions from 2| per cent, to 3 per cent. A measure has been passed providing encouraging concessions for foreign investments in Italy before the end of 1939. PUBLIC RESENTMENT. SULLEN RESENTMENT SHOWN IN ROME. DESPERATE FINANCIAL EXPEDIENT. (Received Wednesday, 7.45 p.m.) LONDON, October 20. The “Daily Telegraph” says Italy’s capital levy has not affected London, as British commitments in Italy are negligible. Nevertheless the action has caused some pessimism, as it indicates that Italy has reached an end of her < normal tax resources and has decided to adopt desperate financial Z expedients. In Rome the Government’s decision-' to impose a capital levy was announced only after the stock markets had closed. It was received with sullen resentment. “The Times” Rome correspondent says that even Government apologists do not pretend that the levy will be popular, but they justify it on the grounds that all forms of property have benefited from the devaluation of the lire. Companies possessing capital of over a million sterling are permitted to pay the levy in the form of shares, while companies showing losses over the last three years pay only a quarter of the levy. The capital levy and other increases in taxation are expected to yield a hundred million sterling, which is being used to meet the cost of the Abyssinian war and of rearmament.

Cabinet has also approved special measures to attract foreign capital to Italy, including freedom from inheritance tax and assurances that investments will not be confiscated, or the free disposal of them, to be limited in time of war. , ;