The Dhaka Stock Exchange on Tuesday urged the National Board of Revenue not to impose any tax on capital gains of general investors in the upcoming national budget for the financial year 2024-25.
At a press conference in the capital Dhaka, DSE chairman Hafiz Md Hasan Babu said that the stock market was going through a critical time and imposing capital gain tax on general investors would create negative impact on the market.
The proposal came at the pre-budget press conference organised by the DSE following the media reports that the NBR would impose tax on capital gains of the individual investors on the capital market, which is currently tax free.
鈥楾he news of possible implementation of capital gain tax created panic among the investors. The market may dive further if capital gain tax was imposed on small investors,鈥� he said
The DSE chairman spoke about the already existing negative effects of the Covid pandemic and ongoing global geopolitical tensions on the capital market investors鈥� sentiment.
He said, 鈥楢ny kind of tax imposed will be a burden for the capital investors as the market has been in a critical situation due to various reasons, like the pandemic, Russia-Ukraine war and global crisis.鈥�
The DSE also placed a proposal to increase the corporate tax gap between listed and non-listed companies to at least 10 per cent, which is currently 7.5 per cent.
They also proposed to decrease the tax at source in trading stocks to 0.02 per cent from 0.05 per cent.