The Parliamentary Committee on Finance, Taxation and Customs Policy is preparing a draft law on additional taxation of net interest income or excess profits of banks, which is likely to come into force in 2024 and bring UAH 10 billion to the budget annually, Committee Chairman Danylo Hetmantsev told Forbes Ukraine.
“It’s not an easy question, we are still evaluating it,” Deputy Governor of the National Bank Serhiy Nikolaychuk commented on the proposal on Facebook.
It is noted that parliamentarians are considering two options for taxation: a tax on all net interest income received for the year at a relatively small or medium rate, or a tax on the difference between net interest income in the reporting year and the average value for the last three to four years.
“For example, in Spain, it is 4.8%,” Mr. Hetmantsev said, referring to the first option.
He clarified that in this country, net commission income of banks is also taxed. “But this is not our story: banks have not yet reached the pre-war level in this regard,” the head of the Financial Committee said.
Commenting on the second option, Mr. Hetmantsev noted that the rate should be high. “For example, in Lithuania, 50% of the difference between net interest income in the base year and its average value over the previous four years is taxed at 60%,” he explained.
According to the committee chairman, the option of taxing all net interest income earned during the year is more optimal.
Mr. Hetmantsev added that he proposes to introduce this tax temporarily: from January 1, 2024, for two years.
He noted that the main motivation for the innovation is the need for additional funding for defense spending.
According to the head of the Finance Committee, the draft law is ready, and after consultations with the Ministry of Finance, the National Bank, specialized associations and the President’s Office, it will be submitted to the Verkhovna Rada.
Mr. Hetmantsev added that there have been no consultations with the market yet. “Although it is not difficult to predict the position of banks,” he said.
As reported, the profit of operating Ukrainian banks in January-June 2023 amounted to UAH 67.65 billion, while the banks ended the same period last year with a net loss of UAH 4.65 billion. This figure is a record high for the first half of the year: the previous highest net profit for the first half of the year was in 2019 – UAH 31.04 billion, compared to UAH 23.79 billion in 2020 and UAH 30.08 billion in pre-war 2021.
According to the NBU, net interest income increased by 40.8% to UAH 93.62 billion in the first half of 2023, commission income by 22.3% to UAH 25.60 billion, and the result from revaluation and purchase and sale transactions increased by 35.8% to UAH 16.30 billion.
Record profits also allowed banks to pay a record corporate income tax in the first half of this year – UAH 12.44 billion, compared to UAH 1.21 billion in the first half of last year and UAH 2.5 billion in pre-war 2021.
In an op-ed in NV on Friday, National Bank Deputy Governor Sergiy Nikolaychuk reiterated the regulator’s position that accusations of overpayment on certificates of deposit are “fundamentally false, manipulative, and dangerous.” He emphasized that the main goal is to achieve price stability and tie up the high liquidity of the banking system caused by the war.
According to him, in the first 7 months of this year, the NBU paid UAH 48.6 billion on certificates of deposit, compared to UAH 40.3 billion last year and UAH 6.3-10.7 billion annually in 2015-2021, but the average daily balance on certificates of deposit increased to UAH 411.4 billion by August this year, from UAH 215.7 billion at the end of 2022 and UAH 145.4 billion at the end of 2021.
