NA committee to take up KSE crash report

The National Assembly’s standing committee on finance is going to reopen the issue of forensic report on last year’s stock exchange crash and discuss the delayed Anti-Money Laundering Bill, 2006, when it meets at the Parliament House here on Wednesday.

The Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan will brief the committee on sale/liquidation options for the Crescent Standard Investment Bank and the financial regularities committed there by the board of directors and other high-level officials.

The committee will also be briefed on the status of the over Rs22 billion tax refund scam in which some high-level officials of the Central Board of Revenue and a company are said to be involved.

CBR finds invisible profits of cement sector

The Central Board of Revenue is all set to zero in on the ‘invisible areas’ of cement sector’s tax reporting.

In the light of research-oriented audit conducted by CBR, several measures are being finalised and would shortly be presented before Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) for formal approval with a view to enhancing tax collection from cement manufacturers.

The findings of report cover several ‘invisible areas’ in the calculation of profit of cement factories and recommends measures for tapping it. The price of a cement bag should not exceed Rs200 but due to manufacturers’ own syndicate and price mechanism as well as their agents in the market, they succeeded in selling cement at Rs380 per bag a few months back.

Certificates for Islamic banks launched

Governor State Bank of Pakistan, Dr Shamshad Akhtar announced on Saturday the launch of Shariah-compliant Bait-ul-Maal Certificates (BMCs) as a new liquidity management product of Islamic banks so that they could manage their liquidity by investing in this product of the central government.

The BMCs will not replace present T-bills, managed and controlled by the central bank on behalf of the Ministry of Finance. At present, the Islamic banks are not participating in T-bills auction because of the involvement of interest payment.

No new tax on stock brokers: CBR chief

Central Board of Revenue (CBR) Chairman Abdullah Yousuf has said no new tax will be levied in any form on stock brokers, nor there is any proposal under consideration in this regard. Talking to a select group of media men after having a detailed meeting with heads and members of Alternate Dispute Resolution Committees (ADRs) at Directorate General of Income Tax Training here Saturday night, he said there was no need to levy another tax on stock brokers as they were already paying withholding tax and capital value tax.