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With the advent of Republic Act (RA) No. 10963, or the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion (TRAIN) Law, taxpayers and tax practitioners have lauded the amendment made under Section 100 of the National Internal Revenue Code (NIRC). Section 100 imposes donor’s tax on the transfer of property for less than adequate or full consideration in money or money’s worth. The amendment provides an exception to the general rule. In this case, a transaction that is bona fide, at arm’s length, and free from any donative intent will be considered made for an adequate and full consideration, even if the selling price is lower than the established fair market value (FMV).

In December 2017, US lawmakers enacted the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA), the country’s biggest overhaul of tax legislation for a generation – you’ll have to go back to 1986 for anything as far-reaching. The impact on corporate earnings and investment plans are appearing significant and further opportunities are unfolding. However, a year on from being passed in Congress, the legislation is still subject to considerable interpretation.

At the start of the month, or even a week or two prior to February 1st, all of us begin to see love symbols everywhere. Roses, cards, and chocolates are visibly on sale in all malls. Delivery boys rush to send these items to ensure the receipt of the intended party on or before the big V-Day.

News of the approval of the Tax Amnesty Act as Republic Act No. 11213 came out early morning on Sunday, February 17. It was signed on Feb. 14. The reports also indicated that the President vetoed the provisions on the general tax amnesty.

The Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) issued Revenue Regulations (RR) No. 22-2018 to further supplement RR No. 11-2018 on the changes to the withholding tax rates of the following transactions:

(Last part) It started without warning when the malware hit Prix Healthcare Inc.’s servers. The new strain infected the company’s systems like silent wildfire, burning through the cyber kill chain unabated. The hacker advanced easily from each step on the kill chain; he harvested enough email addresses during his reconnaissance to know all about Mark’s secret affair with a staff member, that he enjoyed a high-speed virtual private network connection to the office’s network, and that Mark maintains several personal email addresses. He weaponized his exploit of choice into an unassuming PDF (portable document format) file, and delivered the payload as an email masquerading as a legitimate corporate travel agent. A typical customized whale-phishing email attack will do the trick, the hacker’s eyes gleamed, easy peasy. The code executed after exploiting a known vulnerability, and then the malware installed on the server—the asset, lighting up his target. He knew no one in Prix had the foresight, skill, and time to hunt for abnormal outbound network activities or packets that the now-infected system will be sending to call home—and engage the next step in the chain, command and control.

A tax amnesty is an opportunity to start over with a clean slate. Taxpayers with ongoing audits would consider this an opportunity to settle deficiency taxes more efficiently. An audit, even for taxpayers who are compliant, is costly and stressful. To quantify the degree of relief on offer, some tax accountants and managers have computed the savings that can be realized and even prepared position papers to argue the benefits of availing of a tax amnesty, noting that they outweigh the costs.

IN IMPLEMENTING the changes to income taxation for individuals under the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion (Train) Law, the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) issued Revenue Memorandum Circular 17-2019, requiring individual taxpayers to use the latest version of BIR Form 1701A, or the annual income tax return for individuals earning purely from business or profession, in filing their annual income tax return and paying their income tax dues for calendar year 2018 on or before April 15, 2019.