Dividend imputation
Encyclopedia
Dividend imputation is a corporate tax
system in which some or all of the tax paid by a company may be attributed, or imputed
, to the shareholders by way of a tax credit
to reduce the income tax payable on a distribution. In comparison to the classical system, it reduces or eliminates the tax disadvantages of distributing dividends to shareholders by only requiring them to pay the difference between the corporate rate and their marginal rate.
Australia
and New Zealand
have imputation systems. The United Kingdom
has a modified imputation system. France
had a dividend imputation system until 2004.
not the dividends received but the grossed-up amount back-calculated from that dividend and the current tax rate, then have their income tax
payable calculated thereupon, then use franking credits to offset tax payable at the rate of a dollar per credit. In Australia
& New Zealand
the end result is the elimination of double taxation
upon company profits.
* tc = company tax rate.
* fp = franking proportion.
For a company that pays tax on all its income in Australia, the franking proportion is usually 100% (or 1.0). However, some companies (particularly those paying tax outside of Australia) have a lower franking proportion. Some companies pay only unfranked dividends (i.e. fp=0).
/Keating
government. Prior to that a company would pay company tax on its profits and if it then paid a dividend, that dividend was taxed again as income for the shareholder, i.e. a part owner of the company, a form of double taxation
.
In 1997 the eligibility rules (below) were introduced, with a $2000 small shareholder exemption. In 1999 that exemption was raised to the present $5000. In 2000 franking credits became fully refundable, not just reducing tax liability to zero. In 2002 preferential dividend streaming was banned. And in 2003 New Zealand
companies could elect to join the system for Australian tax they paid.
and other elements are in the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997
.
When a company makes $1.00 of profit (profit for tax purposes) and pays $0.30 as income tax (30% rate for 2006) it records the $0.30 in a franking account. The $0.30 is paid in cash to the tax office, the franking account is only a record of what was paid.
When the company pays a dividend, either in the same year or later, it may attach a franking credit from its franking account, in proportion to the tax rate. So each $0.70 of dividend may have $0.30 of franking credit attached. The franking amount is again just a record, only $0.70 of cash is paid. Such a dividend is called a franked dividend.
An eligible shareholder receiving a franked dividend declares the cash amount plus the franking credit as income, and is credited with the franking credit against their final tax bill. The effect is as if the tax office reversed the company tax by giving back the $0.30 to the shareholder and had them treat the original $1.00 of profit as income, in the shareholder's hands, like the company was merely a conduit.
Thus company profits going to eligible shareholders are taxed just once. Profits are either retained by the company and taxed there at the corporate rate, or paid out later as dividends and instead they're taxed at the shareholder's rate.
Dividends may still be paid by a company when it has no franking credits (perhaps because it has been making tax losses), this is called an unfranked dividend. Or it may pay a franked portion and an unfranked portion, known as partly franked. An unfranked dividend (or the unfranked portion) is ordinary income
in the hands of the shareholder.
article. This means that not only can they reduce a taxpayer's total tax liability to zero, but any excess is refunded. For example an individual with income below the tax-free threshold ($6000 in 2006) pays no tax at all and can get franking credits back in full as cash, at the end of the year.
Prior to 1 July 2000 franking credits were "wasting", any excess over one's total tax payable was lost. For example an individual at that time paying no tax could get nothing back, they merely kept the cash part of the dividend received.
from the tax office, but nonetheless it and the cash portion make up pre-tax income. Thus a franked dividend of $0.70 plus $0.30 credit is exactly equivalent to an unfranked dividend of $1.00, or to bank interest
of $1.00, or any other ordinary income of that amount. (It's exactly equivalent because franking is fully refundable, as described above.)
Franked dividends are often described as a "tax effective" form of income. The basis for this is that the cash $0.70 looks like it's taxed at a lower rate than other income. For example, for an individual on the top rate of 48.5% (for 2006) the calculation is $0.70 plus $0.30 credit is $1.00 on which $0.485 tax is payable, but less the $0.30 credit makes $0.185 net tax, which is just 26.4% of the original $0.70. Conversely, an individual on the 20% marginal tax rate actually gets a $0.10 rebate. In this latter case, the rebate looks very much like negative tax.
There's nothing inherently wrong with the latter way of thinking about franked dividends, and it is frequently made to demonstrate how franking benefits the investor, but it can be argued a grossing-up like the former is better when comparing yields across different investment opportunities.
Or who
Thus franking credits are not available to short-term traders, only to longer term holders, but with small holders exempted provided it's for their own benefit.
The small shareholder exemption is not a "first $5000", but rather once the $5000 threshold is passed the rule is inoperative and all one's shares are under the holding period rule.
For the holding period rule, parcels of shares bought and sold at different times are reckoned on a "first in, last out" basis. Each sale is taken to be of the most recently purchased shares. This prevents a taxpayer buying just before a dividend, selling just after, and asserting it was older shares sold (to try to fulfill the holding period).
This "first in, last out" reckoning may be contrasted with capital gains tax
. For capital gains the shareholder can nominate what parcel was sold from among those bought at different times.
This transfer of credits has made the previous "intercorporate rebates" allowances redundant. Those rebates had avoided double taxation on dividends paid from companies to other companies. Those rebates were part of the original 1936 taxation act (section 46), meaning that the principle of eliminating double taxation has been present to some degree in Australian income tax law for a very long time.
The company tax rate has changed a few times through the life of dividend imputation. In each case transitional rules have been made to maintain the principle of reversing the original tax paid, even if the tax rate has changed. This has been either by separate franking accounts for separate rates (eg. class A 39%, class B 33%), or making an adjusting recalculation of the credits (eg. into class C 30%).
companies can apply to join the Australian dividend imputation system (from 2003). Doing so allows them to attach Australian franking credits to their dividends, for Australian tax they have paid. Those credits can then be used by shareholders who are Australian taxpayers, the same as dividends from an Australian company.
There are certain anti-tax-avoidance rules to prevent New Zealand companies deliberately streaming Australian franking credits towards their Australian shareholders; credits must be distributed on a pro-rata basis.
Note that it is only Australian franking credits which can be used by an Australian taxpayer. New Zealand imputation credits on dividends paid to an Australian shareholder cannot be used against that shareholder's Australian taxes.
In the past it was permissible for corporations to direct the flow of franking credits preferentially to one type of shareholder over another so that each may benefit the most as fits their tax circumstances. For example foreign shareholders cannot use franking credits (they can't be offset against withholding tax
) but Australian shareholders can. This practice, known as dividend streaming, became illegal in 2002, whereafter all dividends within a given time frame must now be franked to a similar (but need not be identical) degree irrespective of shareholder location or which class of shares held.
.
It could be argued, however, that a residual bias in favour of obtaining the credits may exist because it is cheaper for the corporation to retain more profits and pay less tax than to ignore the tax break and obtain the same funds from shareholders at some future date. How significant such an inclination to use corporate tax breaks for this purpose is debatable.
In October 2006, the Committee for Economic Development of Australia
released a report, Tax Cuts to Compete, concluding that dividend imputation had proved an inefficient means of reducing Australia's cost of capital. The report, authored by prominent economist Dr Nicholas Gruen, argued that the elimination of imputation would allow the funding of a substantial corporate tax cut. This would attract foreign investment and thus increase economic growth, it said.
(ACT) paid by a company when a distribution was made. A company could set off ACT against the company's annual corporation tax liability, subject to limitations.
In 1999 ACT was abolished. Shareholders receiving a dividend are still entitled to a tax credit which offsets their tax liability, but the tax credit no longer necessarily represents tax paid by the company, and cannot be refunded to the shareholder.
Corporate tax
Many countries impose corporate tax or company tax on the income or capital of some types of legal entities. A similar tax may be imposed at state or lower levels. The taxes may also be referred to as income tax or capital tax. Entities treated as partnerships are generally not taxed at the...
system in which some or all of the tax paid by a company may be attributed, or imputed
Imputation (economics)
In economics, the theory of imputation, first expounded by Carl Menger, maintains that factor prices are determined by output prices.This is the opposite of the labor theory of value maintained by classical economists such as Adam Smith and David Ricardo....
, to the shareholders by way of a tax credit
Tax credit
A tax credit is a sum deducted from the total amount a taxpayer owes to the state. A tax credit may be granted for various types of taxes, such as an income tax, property tax, or VAT. It may be granted in recognition of taxes already paid, as a subsidy, or to encourage investment or other behaviors...
to reduce the income tax payable on a distribution. In comparison to the classical system, it reduces or eliminates the tax disadvantages of distributing dividends to shareholders by only requiring them to pay the difference between the corporate rate and their marginal rate.
Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
and New Zealand
Taxation in New Zealand
Taxation in New Zealand is collected at a national level by the Inland Revenue Department on behalf of the Government of New Zealand. National taxes are levied on personal and business income, as well as on the supply of goods and services. There is no capital gains tax although certain "gains"...
have imputation systems. The United Kingdom
United Kingdom corporation tax
Corporation tax is a tax levied in the United Kingdom on the profits made by companies and on the profits of permanent establishments of non-UK resident companies and associations that trade in the EU. Prior to the tax's enactment on 1 April 1965, companies and individuals paid the same income tax,...
has a modified imputation system. France
Taxation in France
Taxation in France is determined by the yearly budget vote by the French Parliament, which determines which kinds of taxes can be levied and which rates can be applied.-Overview:...
had a dividend imputation system until 2004.
Australia
The Australian tax system allows companies to attach franking credits to dividends paid. A franking credit is a nominal unit of tax paid by companies using dividend imputation. Franking credits are passed on to shareholders along with dividends. Shareholders include in their assessable incomeIncome
Income is the consumption and savings opportunity gained by an entity within a specified time frame, which is generally expressed in monetary terms. However, for households and individuals, "income is the sum of all the wages, salaries, profits, interests payments, rents and other forms of earnings...
not the dividends received but the grossed-up amount back-calculated from that dividend and the current tax rate, then have their income tax
Income tax
An income tax is a tax levied on the income of individuals or businesses . Various income tax systems exist, with varying degrees of tax incidence. Income taxation can be progressive, proportional, or regressive. When the tax is levied on the income of companies, it is often called a corporate...
payable calculated thereupon, then use franking credits to offset tax payable at the rate of a dollar per credit. In Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
& New Zealand
New Zealand
New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...
the end result is the elimination of double taxation
Double taxation
Double taxation is the systematic imposition of two or more taxes on the same income , asset , or financial transaction . It refers to taxation by two or more countries of the same income, asset or transaction, for example income paid by an entity of one country to a resident of a different country...
upon company profits.
Franking Credit Formula
Div * tc / (1 - tc) * fp* tc = company tax rate.
* fp = franking proportion.
For a company that pays tax on all its income in Australia, the franking proportion is usually 100% (or 1.0). However, some companies (particularly those paying tax outside of Australia) have a lower franking proportion. Some companies pay only unfranked dividends (i.e. fp=0).
History
Dividend imputation was introduced in 1987, one of a number of tax reforms by the HawkeBob Hawke
Robert James Lee "Bob" Hawke AC GCL was the 23rd Prime Minister of Australia from March 1983 to December 1991 and therefore longest serving Australian Labor Party Prime Minister....
/Keating
Paul Keating
Paul John Keating was the 24th Prime Minister of Australia, serving from 1991 to 1996. Keating was elected as the federal Labor member for Blaxland in 1969 and came to prominence as the reformist treasurer of the Hawke Labor government, which came to power at the 1983 election...
government. Prior to that a company would pay company tax on its profits and if it then paid a dividend, that dividend was taxed again as income for the shareholder, i.e. a part owner of the company, a form of double taxation
Double taxation
Double taxation is the systematic imposition of two or more taxes on the same income , asset , or financial transaction . It refers to taxation by two or more countries of the same income, asset or transaction, for example income paid by an entity of one country to a resident of a different country...
.
In 1997 the eligibility rules (below) were introduced, with a $2000 small shareholder exemption. In 1999 that exemption was raised to the present $5000. In 2000 franking credits became fully refundable, not just reducing tax liability to zero. In 2002 preferential dividend streaming was banned. And in 2003 New Zealand
New Zealand
New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...
companies could elect to join the system for Australian tax they paid.
Operation
The present operation of the system is as follows. The actual law is complex, the core is in the Income Tax Assessment Act 1936Income Tax Assessment Act 1936
Income Tax Assessment Act 1936 is an act of the Parliament of Australia. It's one of the main statutes under which income tax is calculated. The act is gradually being rewritten into the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997, and new matters are generally now added to the 1997 act.The reason for...
and other elements are in the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997
Income Tax Assessment Act 1997
Income Tax Assessment Act 1997 is an act of the Parliament of Australia. It's one of the main statutes under which income tax is calculated. The act is a rewrite in plain English of the prior Income Tax Assessment Act 1936...
.
When a company makes $1.00 of profit (profit for tax purposes) and pays $0.30 as income tax (30% rate for 2006) it records the $0.30 in a franking account. The $0.30 is paid in cash to the tax office, the franking account is only a record of what was paid.
When the company pays a dividend, either in the same year or later, it may attach a franking credit from its franking account, in proportion to the tax rate. So each $0.70 of dividend may have $0.30 of franking credit attached. The franking amount is again just a record, only $0.70 of cash is paid. Such a dividend is called a franked dividend.
An eligible shareholder receiving a franked dividend declares the cash amount plus the franking credit as income, and is credited with the franking credit against their final tax bill. The effect is as if the tax office reversed the company tax by giving back the $0.30 to the shareholder and had them treat the original $1.00 of profit as income, in the shareholder's hands, like the company was merely a conduit.
Thus company profits going to eligible shareholders are taxed just once. Profits are either retained by the company and taxed there at the corporate rate, or paid out later as dividends and instead they're taxed at the shareholder's rate.
Dividends may still be paid by a company when it has no franking credits (perhaps because it has been making tax losses), this is called an unfranked dividend. Or it may pay a franked portion and an unfranked portion, known as partly franked. An unfranked dividend (or the unfranked portion) is ordinary income
Ordinary income
Under the United States Internal Revenue Code, the type of income is defined by its character. Ordinary income is usually characterized as income other than capital gain...
in the hands of the shareholder.
Refund
Franking credits are (as of the 2000-2001 year, ie from 1.7.00) "refundable" in the sense described in the tax creditTax credit
A tax credit is a sum deducted from the total amount a taxpayer owes to the state. A tax credit may be granted for various types of taxes, such as an income tax, property tax, or VAT. It may be granted in recognition of taxes already paid, as a subsidy, or to encourage investment or other behaviors...
article. This means that not only can they reduce a taxpayer's total tax liability to zero, but any excess is refunded. For example an individual with income below the tax-free threshold ($6000 in 2006) pays no tax at all and can get franking credits back in full as cash, at the end of the year.
Prior to 1 July 2000 franking credits were "wasting", any excess over one's total tax payable was lost. For example an individual at that time paying no tax could get nothing back, they merely kept the cash part of the dividend received.
Investors
The easiest way for an investor to value a franked dividend is to think of the franking credit as part of the income they receive. The investor doesn't get it in cash, only as a kind of IOUIOU (debt)
An IOU is usually an informal document acknowledging debt. An IOU differs from a promissory note in that an IOU is not a negotiable instrument and does not specify repayment terms such as the time of repayment. IOUs usually specify the debtor, the amount owed, and sometimes the creditor...
from the tax office, but nonetheless it and the cash portion make up pre-tax income. Thus a franked dividend of $0.70 plus $0.30 credit is exactly equivalent to an unfranked dividend of $1.00, or to bank interest
Interest
Interest is a fee paid by a borrower of assets to the owner as a form of compensation for the use of the assets. It is most commonly the price paid for the use of borrowed money, or money earned by deposited funds....
of $1.00, or any other ordinary income of that amount. (It's exactly equivalent because franking is fully refundable, as described above.)
Franked dividends are often described as a "tax effective" form of income. The basis for this is that the cash $0.70 looks like it's taxed at a lower rate than other income. For example, for an individual on the top rate of 48.5% (for 2006) the calculation is $0.70 plus $0.30 credit is $1.00 on which $0.485 tax is payable, but less the $0.30 credit makes $0.185 net tax, which is just 26.4% of the original $0.70. Conversely, an individual on the 20% marginal tax rate actually gets a $0.10 rebate. In this latter case, the rebate looks very much like negative tax.
There's nothing inherently wrong with the latter way of thinking about franked dividends, and it is frequently made to demonstrate how franking benefits the investor, but it can be argued a grossing-up like the former is better when comparing yields across different investment opportunities.
Eligibility
There are restrictions on who can use franking credits. Those who cannot must simply declare as income the cash dividend amount they receive. . The restrictions are designed to prevent the trading of franking credits between different taxpayers. An eligible shareholder is one who either- Owns the shares for a continuous period of 45 days or more (not counting purchase and sale days); or 90 days in the case of certain preference sharePreferred stockPreferred stock, also called preferred shares, preference shares, or simply preferreds, is a special equity security that has properties of both an equity and a debt instrument and is generally considered a hybrid instrument...
s. This is the "holding period rule". Shares must be "at risk" for the necessary period, ie. not with an offsetting derivativeDerivative (finance)A derivative instrument is a contract between two parties that specifies conditions—in particular, dates and the resulting values of the underlying variables—under which payments, or payoffs, are to be made between the parties.Under U.S...
s position for instance.
Or who
- Has total franking credits for the tax year of less than $5000 (the "small shareholder exemption") and has not arranged to pass-on the benefits to someone else (the "related payments rule").
Thus franking credits are not available to short-term traders, only to longer term holders, but with small holders exempted provided it's for their own benefit.
The small shareholder exemption is not a "first $5000", but rather once the $5000 threshold is passed the rule is inoperative and all one's shares are under the holding period rule.
For the holding period rule, parcels of shares bought and sold at different times are reckoned on a "first in, last out" basis. Each sale is taken to be of the most recently purchased shares. This prevents a taxpayer buying just before a dividend, selling just after, and asserting it was older shares sold (to try to fulfill the holding period).
This "first in, last out" reckoning may be contrasted with capital gains tax
Capital gains tax
A capital gains tax is a tax charged on capital gains, the profit realized on the sale of a non-inventory asset that was purchased at a lower price. The most common capital gains are realized from the sale of stocks, bonds, precious metals and property...
. For capital gains the shareholder can nominate what parcel was sold from among those bought at different times.
Company Matters
If a company owns shares in another company and receives franking credits on dividends, those franking credits are added to the receiving company's accounts, and can be paid out in the same way as franking credits generated from taxes.This transfer of credits has made the previous "intercorporate rebates" allowances redundant. Those rebates had avoided double taxation on dividends paid from companies to other companies. Those rebates were part of the original 1936 taxation act (section 46), meaning that the principle of eliminating double taxation has been present to some degree in Australian income tax law for a very long time.
The company tax rate has changed a few times through the life of dividend imputation. In each case transitional rules have been made to maintain the principle of reversing the original tax paid, even if the tax rate has changed. This has been either by separate franking accounts for separate rates (eg. class A 39%, class B 33%), or making an adjusting recalculation of the credits (eg. into class C 30%).
Trans-Tasman Imputation
New ZealandNew Zealand
New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...
companies can apply to join the Australian dividend imputation system (from 2003). Doing so allows them to attach Australian franking credits to their dividends, for Australian tax they have paid. Those credits can then be used by shareholders who are Australian taxpayers, the same as dividends from an Australian company.
There are certain anti-tax-avoidance rules to prevent New Zealand companies deliberately streaming Australian franking credits towards their Australian shareholders; credits must be distributed on a pro-rata basis.
Note that it is only Australian franking credits which can be used by an Australian taxpayer. New Zealand imputation credits on dividends paid to an Australian shareholder cannot be used against that shareholder's Australian taxes.
Abuses of the system
A company is not obliged to attach franking credits to its dividends. But it costs the company nothing to do so, and the credits will benefit eligible shareholders, so it is usual to attach the maximum available. It's actually possible for a company to attach more than it has, but doing so attracts tax penalties that mean this is not worthwhile.In the past it was permissible for corporations to direct the flow of franking credits preferentially to one type of shareholder over another so that each may benefit the most as fits their tax circumstances. For example foreign shareholders cannot use franking credits (they can't be offset against withholding tax
Withholding tax
Withholding tax, also called retention tax, is a government requirement for the payer of an item of income to withhold or deduct tax from the payment, and pay that tax to the government. In most jurisdictions, withholding tax applies to employment income. Many jurisdictions also require...
) but Australian shareholders can. This practice, known as dividend streaming, became illegal in 2002, whereafter all dividends within a given time frame must now be franked to a similar (but need not be identical) degree irrespective of shareholder location or which class of shares held.
Elimination of Tax Incentives
It is also interesting to note that it was soon realised that the system eliminated to a considerable extent the effectiveness of tax incentives for corporations. If a corporation was given a tax break then its incomes thus released from taxation would not generate franking credits precisely because no tax was paid. In turn, this meant that the shareholders received fewer credits along with their dividends, meaning in turn that they had to pay more tax. The net result is that each tax break a corporation itself got was countered by a matching increase in the tax burden of shareholders, leaving shareholders in exactly the same position had no tax break been received by the corporation. Thus, to the extent that corporate directors acted so as to increase shareholder wealth, tax incentives would not influence corporate behaviourCorporate behaviour
Corporate behaviour is the behaviour of an organisation when considered as a single body.The behaviour of an organisation is influenced by the arrangements for its ownership and control...
.
It could be argued, however, that a residual bias in favour of obtaining the credits may exist because it is cheaper for the corporation to retain more profits and pay less tax than to ignore the tax break and obtain the same funds from shareholders at some future date. How significant such an inclination to use corporate tax breaks for this purpose is debatable.
Politics and economics
Dividend imputation has been uncontroversial over most of its lifetime. Investors and their advisors recognise the benefits and are supportive.In October 2006, the Committee for Economic Development of Australia
Committee for Economic Development of Australia
is an independent, bipartisan, non-profit forum and think tank. Its expressed aim is to "promote national economic development in a sustainable and socially balanced way." Sydney Morning Herald economics editor Ross Gittins has described CEDA as seeking to "inform the public debate without lobbying"...
released a report, Tax Cuts to Compete, concluding that dividend imputation had proved an inefficient means of reducing Australia's cost of capital. The report, authored by prominent economist Dr Nicholas Gruen, argued that the elimination of imputation would allow the funding of a substantial corporate tax cut. This would attract foreign investment and thus increase economic growth, it said.
New Zealand
New Zealand introduced a dividend imputation system in 1989. It operates on similar principles to the Australian system. A shareholder receiving a dividend from a company is entitled to an "imputation credit", which represents tax paid by the company, and is used to reduce or eliminate the shareholder's income tax liability.United Kingdom
From 1973 to 1999, the UK operated an imputation system, with shareholders able to claim a tax credit reflecting advance corporation taxAdvance corporation tax
In the United Kingdom, the Advance corporation tax was the scheme under which companies made an advance payment of tax when they distributed dividend payments to shareholders...
(ACT) paid by a company when a distribution was made. A company could set off ACT against the company's annual corporation tax liability, subject to limitations.
In 1999 ACT was abolished. Shareholders receiving a dividend are still entitled to a tax credit which offsets their tax liability, but the tax credit no longer necessarily represents tax paid by the company, and cannot be refunded to the shareholder.
See also
- Corporate taxCorporate taxMany countries impose corporate tax or company tax on the income or capital of some types of legal entities. A similar tax may be imposed at state or lower levels. The taxes may also be referred to as income tax or capital tax. Entities treated as partnerships are generally not taxed at the...
- Dividend strippingDividend strippingDividend stripping is the purchase of shares just before a dividend is paid, and the sale of those shares after that payment, i.e. when they go ex-dividend....
, on buying shares to access dividends - Dividend taxDividend taxA dividend tax is an income tax on dividend payments to the stockholders of a company.-Collection:In many jurisdictions, the government requires the company to withhold at least the standard tax, paying this to the national revenue authorities and paying out only the balance to the...
- :fr:Avoir fiscal (in French)