11/5/09 - The Bulgarian government is currently levelling the gambling taxation field with an increase from 10 percent to 12 percent on all gambling activities as part of amendments to the Corporate Income Tax Act, reports Novinite.
The bill passed its first reading in the Bulgarian parliament this week, and affects a myriad other commercial activities in the country as well.
Should it be adopted at second reading, the change will come into force at the beginning of 2010 in a bid to rationalise the tax rate for all organisers of gambling activities. Sweepstakes, raffles and lotteries are already taxed at the rate of 12 percent.
The increase in taxes on the Bulgarian state lottery, the Lotto and betting on sporting competitions will boost state budget revenues by BGN 12 million, the deputy Minister of Finance, Vladislav Goranov, said.
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The Chair of the Parliamentary Budget Commission, Menda Stoyanova, declared her support for an increase in the tax on gambling, while the Blue Coalition and the Party for Order, Justice and Equality (RZS) proposed that this tax be increased to 15 percent.
According to other changes adopted, foreign EU companies will have a choice as to recalculation and consequent reimbursement of part of withheld taxes, in the same way as Bulgarian citizens are treated.
The MPs also adopted a measure to ensure that profits of foreign companies from sale of commercial sites would be taxed. Concessions in the amount of tax paid would be proportional to any donations made to the following Bulgarian organizations: Fund for Treatment of Children, Fund for Assisted Reproduction and Fund for Transplants.
Gambling regulation and taxation is find but I'd prefer to see an EU-wide system of regulation. We should be able to bet freely, wherever the heck we like, within a fairly regulated system. Singling us out for discrimination is just not on. There is a Right2Bet petition, at www.right2bet.net - which is aimed at further improving the EU online gambling rules. I'd encourage you to sign!