Hungarian foreign minister called his Chinese counterpart

Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó has consulted by phone with Chinese counterpart Wang Yi, and discussed economic bilateral ties amid the current global turmoil.

Szijjarto said on social media on Sunday that Chinese corporate investors in Hungary were content with their local operations, while Hungary was taking action to ensure that the country maintained its competitive investment environment.

He noted the impact of the war in Ukraine in Europe and the broader world, including a rife inflationary environment, skyrocketing energy prices, a food supply crisis and new waves of migration which “threaten global stability”.

“I underscored that Hungary has an interest in the quickest possible restoration of peace, given this is the only solution to the challenges thrown up by the war that confront us,”

the minister wrote.

• Read also: Hungary does not approve of giving Russia and China a similar threat level
  Source: dailynewshungary.com

25 pc corporate tax rate for multinationals in Hungary?

Opposition LMP has proposed introducing an upper 25 percent corporate tax rate to ensure that multinational companies take their fair share of the public burden, the head of the party’s parliamentary group said on Sunday. The government claims that the itemised tax for small businesses (kata) is a form of legalised tax fraud which must be terminated, Péter Ungár told a press conference. LMP, however, believes it is the very low corporate tax paid by multinational companies “that is the real legalised tax fraud”.

Péter Ungár, parliamentary group leader of LMP, Hungary’s green party. Photo: FB/ungarpeter

Revenues from corporate tax amounted to 500 billion forints (EUR 1.25bn) in 2021, Ungar said, whereas Hungarian oil and gas company

MOL had revenue of more than 300 billion forints in the last quarter of last year

— less than two-thirds of the total corporate tax revenue in Hungary that year. He added that Audi repatriated 4,000 billion forints of profits from the country over the past ten years. Partly due to strategic partnership agreements and partly to the very low corporate tax rate, large companies in Hungary are not taking their fair share of the public burden, Ungár said.

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Ungár said it is far easier to collect money that is needed in the budget during a crisis from such large companies than from a small entrepreneur who, say, works in film production and therefore invoices to companies.

He also said that LMP believes it would be highly effective to implement a building insulation programme in the energy crisis. This would reduce household energy costs, Hungary’s energy dependence and greenhouse gas emissions, while creating jobs and stimulating the economy, Ungar said.

Source: MTI