TOKYO: Japan is considering expanding tax breaks and loosening some rules to promote investment in start-ups as part of the second instalment of the government’s economic growth strategy, the Nikkei newspaper reported yesterday.
Japan is also likely to say next month that it will lower the effective corporate tax rate to 20 percent from around 35 percent currently, the Yomiuri newspaper said citing several government sources, which could encourage firms to boost much-needed capital expenditure in Japan.
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s government is set to announce the second part of its growth strategy next month. Investor disappointment with the first instalment of the strategy last year contributed to a decline in Japanese shares.
One proposal is to expand the value of an investment that a so-called angel investor can deduct from his or her taxable income from the current limit of 10m yen ($97,800) to several times as much.
An angel investor is a wealthy individual who invests in promising start-ups that sometimes struggle to get funding from large venture capital firms. Reuters
