budget announcement

Wayne Swan… “Keep your mitts off the MITs!!”

The doubling of the tax rate applicable to international Managed Investment Trusts (MITs), with no consultation nor warning and – it would appear – based upon miss-guided thinking, not just flies in the face of the plan to make Australia “the hub of finance in Asia”, but the sudden move places Australia on the list of countries with significant Sovereign Risk.

As a result Australia is no longer considered so transparent.

Since the budget, we have seen prudent comments from Property Council of Australia and reports from the likes of Business Council of Australia. These confirm what intuition tells us – that 7.5% of something is better than 15% of nothing. Continue reading