Swedish App Developers Hit With A Double VAT
The ever vigilant Swedish tax authorities are reaching into the pockets of Swedish app developers with a 25% value added tax, regardless of where the final sale of the product takes place. Starting this month, apps sold in the EU through third party distributors, such as Facebook or Apple's App Store, will be taxed twice - once in Sweden and a second time at the point of sale. Swedish app developers are understandably unhappy, as the double taxation puts them under a severe competitive disadvantage in the apps market.
Killing Finnish Entrepreneurship With Tax
The debate on the tax code for entrepreneurs in Finland is becoming more surreal by the day. The origins of the debate lie in the tax code working group set up by the Finnish Parliament. This group, headed by Martti Hetemäki, is to devise a new tax code for areas such as capital gains, options and carried interest for VC funds. The biggest verbal and rhetorical battle is waged around the double taxing of dividends in non-listed companies.
Just as with any tax code, the more transparent and simple the tax code to understand, the better it incentivizes people to invest in a risky and uncertain future. The tax code should make it easier to see how the future plays out for businesses, not make it more difficult. All the scenarios the working group is considering are rather complex and won't help the state of entrepreneurship in the country.
Estonia To Make Business Environment Less Friendly Towards Startups
Estonia has previously enjoyed a relatively high reputation among startups and international high tech companies due to its friendly and very incentivised tax environment. Well, if a new law regarding the different kinds of income goes through we might have to say good bye to that reputation. Baltic Business News reports that the government is in talks of revising the Income Tax Law to change the status of benefits, such as share options and shares. Instruments which are highly used by early and later stage companies to motivate employees.
