Gold Production in March
25 June 04   

With the gold prices soaring to 30-month highs of late, this could translate into some further windfalls for the South African taxman. Indeed, amidst the ZAR's rapid fall last year, the South African Revenue Services were able to collect more revenue from the country's mining houses due to the fact that these mining houses earn their revenue in USD's. Although the ZAR has subsequently clawed back some of last year's lost ground, this has been compensated by the recent run on gold, which means that SARS will be able to latch onto some of that subsequent revenue. This year the govt was able to dish out a R15bn tax relief package, which was of main benefit to the lower to middle income earners due to improved tax collection methods. SARS have also been aggressively tracking down tax avoiders as well tax evaders, especially at the top end of the income scale, so as to increase the tax net / maximise the laffer curve. This year's tax relief is believed by some participants to be responsible for some of this year's extended consumer demand, now that pre-emptive buying is a thing of the past. In fact, it has been said that it would take 6 rate hikes of 1% to totally nullify these tax windfalls for certain tax brackets.

 

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e c o n o m e t r i x 24-May-02