{"id":15663,"date":"2010-11-21T00:33:42","date_gmt":"2010-11-21T05:33:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/countingpips.com\/fx\/?p=15663"},"modified":"2010-11-21T00:33:42","modified_gmt":"2010-11-21T05:33:42","slug":"proposed-eu-financial-transaction-tax-will-affect-banks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/2010\/11\/21\/proposed-eu-financial-transaction-tax-will-affect-banks\/","title":{"rendered":"Proposed EU Financial Transaction Tax Will Affect Banks"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By Justin Thomas<\/p>\n<p>Customers face higher bank fees, while non-banking institutions fill the gap providing cheaper <a rel=\"nofollow\" href=\"http:\/\/www.currencysolutions.co.uk\/\" target=\"_new\"><strong>currency transfer<\/strong><\/a> services to clients worldwide<\/p>\n<p>The global financial crisis and the lower budget revenues of governments  worldwide forced policy makers to unshelve the controversial idea of  imposing a tax on financial transactions. Such a move will affect every  single currency transfer around the globe and might well push customers  to look for an alternative to banks and traditional banking.<\/p>\n<p>The proposed tax on financial transactions within the European Union  (EU) will have an adverse impact on the fees banks charge their clients  for currency transfers abroad and transfers between the EU and non-EU  financial institutions, in particular. However, a recent meeting of EU  financial leaders in Brussels failed to work out an agreeable road map  on the subject, giving the entire financial world a breather.<\/p>\n<p>Imposing a tax on financial transactions is not a new idea and was in  the air following the start of the global financial crisis. German  Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy are strong  supporters of the tax on financial transactions while the U.K. and  other EU and non-EU countries expressed doubts that such a tax would  help bring cash to government coffers. According to U.K. Chancellor of  the Exchequer George Osborne, nobody knows how such a tax will  effectively work while other experts explain that the financial  transaction tax will have a negative impact on every single currency  transfer in the world.<\/p>\n<p>If the proposed tax is imposed within the EU, it will affect banks in  two ways. First, share and bond purchases will be subject to taxation  and, second, banks will have to pay additional taxes on profits and  remuneration. Consequently, banks will be forced to raise the fees they  charge for a currency transfer or other financial activities on their  clients in order to compensate for the higher tax.<\/p>\n<p>On the other hand, banks are often reluctant to change and enterprising  non-bank institutions rapidly fill the gap on the market of currency  transfers. These companies respond more quickly and adequately to the  global demand and supply of such services, while traditional banks often  fail to leverage on the support, including financial, they receive from  governments. The technical side of the proposal is less important,  although many experts believe that the introduction of the new tax would  require huge and extensive research into the technical details.<\/p>\n<p>The mere fact that such a discussion has been on the table for so long  suggests that all stakeholders are a long way of reaching an agreement  on the financial transaction tax. Customers, however, should look out  for trouble stemming from the imposition of such taxes; namely, higher  charges for currency and financial transactions, stricter financial  regulations, which sometimes could prove an obstacle to business, as  well as higher costs of moving money abroad.<\/p>\n<p>Reaching a final decision is in the hands of policy makers but average  customers can prepare themselves for the future by discovering new means  and possibilities to lower the costs of their currency transfers. A  possible solution lies with existing non-bank institutions and newborn  business models which can reduce the burden of a new tax on financial  transactions worldwide.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The global financial crisis and the lower budget revenues of governments worldwide forced policy makers to unshelve the controversial idea of imposing a tax on financial transactions. Such a move will affect every single currency transfer<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15663","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15663","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15663"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15663\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15663"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15663"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15663"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}