The calm before the tax storm?

SAVE for an announcement on personal income tax relief which drew mild laughter from the floor, it was all quiet on the tax front until some two hours into Finance Minister Heng Swee Keat's Budget 2019 speech.

And when it came to delivering tax-related measures, Mr Heng dispatched it rather efficiently with a statement that "I will extend and strengthen tax incentives to enhance our business competitiveness". Although the popular refrain is that the devil is in the details, and in this case the details on tax measures were contained in an annex of the Budget speech, the annex proved to be equally sparse and contained only a few corporate tax measures including the extension of corporate tax incentives for Singapore-listed real estate investment trusts and the fund management industry. Even the much hyped "sugar tax" failed to make an appearance in Budget 2019, perhaps to the delight of cola drinkers.

It was all rather ho-hum from a tax perspective.