The province of Alicante is the province that contributes the most to the filling of Generalitat’s coffers in terms of direct tax collection. First of all, thanks to the traction experienced by the housing market, which has become a money making machine for the Autonomous Administration, with numbers in Valencia and Castellón as a whole even exceeding the figures accrued for this concept. Between January and June of this year alone, revenue directly related to the transfer of properties in the real estate market experienced 63% growth and 359 million euros in the Alicante region. Globally, taking into account the total revenue managed by the Valencian Tax Office (ATV), the province contributed €512 million to the regional savings bank in the first half of the year, which is 54% more than the previous year in particular. same period of the previous year.
Data presented by the Ministry of Finance and Economic Model, headed by Arcadi Spain, reveal that the province, as well as the Community as a whole, has not only consolidated the growth path that has begun to be recorded after the toughest blockade by the provinces. The covid pandemic and its important repercussions, but the increase has become more pronounced in recent months. So much so that the Alicante region contributes to the regional treasury by making practically one contribution from every two euros collected through the ATV. And everything is in a scenario affected by the uncertainty created by the Russian occupation of Ukraine and the energy crisis that has kept the major European economies on their toes.
If between January and June of this year the Autonomous Administration received 512 million for operations conducted in the province, this figure rose to 1.063 million in the Valencian Community as a whole, with less emphasis on variation than in the previous year, an increase of almost 34%. It is therefore 20 points less than the average obtained at the provincial level, but in any case of an increasing character.
According to different chapters, the figure settled in the first six months of the year for the Troubled Real Estate Transfer Tax, including the real estate tax, house salecauses an increase in the collection of another tax directly related to such transactions. This is the Documented Legal Transactions Tax levied on, among other things, the formalization of mortgage deeds by the notary. Well, this concept also experienced an uptrend. In the province of Alicante, revenues in this area increased by 26% from €49 million to €62 million. In this case, the variation at the regional level is smaller, but ultimately greater than in the previous year, increasing from 127 to 152 million euros, which means 19% as a percentage.
Collection levels associated with the sale of real estate and with it mortgage loan, due to the explosion recorded in the Community in the first quarter of the year. In fact, the total number of home sales recorded in the Community between April and June, including both, reached 24,906, the highest quarterly result in the last fifteen years, according to data provided by the College Valencia Community Dean’s Office. Spanish Property and Commercial Registrars.
covid legacy
Another tax that has increased significantly is the Inheritance Tax. In this case, it emerged as a result of the increase in death rates as a result of the covid pandemic, which especially affects the elderly. While the deadliest waves of contagion may finally seem like a thing of the past, that’s just when taxes start to accrue on those deaths, as ATV’s chief executive Sonia Díaz predicted. The key is that the arrangement of legacies takes between six months and a year. Therefore, taxes would now be payable on inheritances related to deaths that occurred last year.
So things in the province of Alicante are to blame 62 million for successors by June, last year the figure reached 45 million between January and June, which represents an increase of 38%. Derived from the sad reality left by the pandemic, this presents a similar scenario in the autonomous region as a whole: 150 million euros were raised in the first half compared to 130 million euros in 2021. Therefore, 15% more income in the Valencia treasury.
The global radiography of the tax revenues managed by ATV in the province also shows a significant increase in the donations section. Operations carried out in this regard in the province generated a revenue of 3.72 million, which is 23% higher than the first six months of 2021. The increase since the outbreak of the epidemic. Mainly because families worry more about the future and bet on donating more in life.
Chasing the scammer
ATV’s business is two-dimensional, as explained by the Minister of Finance. On the one hand, to provide assistance to taxpayers who want to fulfill their tax obligations, to help them in every way. But on the other hand, great efforts are being made to catch tax evaders. Not to those who might make an involuntary mistake, as Spain recently clarified, but to those who deliberately try to avoid their tax obligations. However, the Generalitat subsidiary has developed several campaigns in which it is committed to raising awareness, encouraging taxpayers to voluntarily comply with their tax obligations, and promoting voluntary self-assessment. And this is something that makes it possible, as Díaz has pointed out on more than one occasion, to reduce penalties for nonpayment, and even taxpayers are catching late payments from previous years.
However, AVT does not lose sight of those who want to bypass the norm and ultimately defraud the treasury by not paying the money corresponding to them. During 2021, ATV’s control, verification and direct investigation actions allowed the collection of a total of 94.9 million euros, a figure 22.57% higher than in 2020.
These actions correspond to citizens who have to submit their own tax self-assessments and do not do so voluntarily, but through one of the different forms of ATV intervention.
Payment of game-related taxes increased by 43%
Taxes accrued for activities related to games of chance in the province experienced a significant increase in the first half of 2022 and compared to the same period of the previous year. By June, the Valencian Tax Office (ATV) had collected around 25m euros for the development of such activities. 17.5 million entries made between January and June 2021which in practice meant an increase of 43%.
Restrictions due to the Covid pandemic put a business model in the tightrope that was forced to lower the blind for months and then was able to continue operating in part despite severe restrictions. Now, more than two years since the outbreak of covid, it is starting to recover at the regional level as well. In fact, according to data held by the Department of Finance and Economic Model, this increase in collections as a whole in the Valencian Community is estimated to be 52%, close to 68 million euros in the above-mentioned period.
Slot machines that mark Alicante’s borders remain a type of game of chance, which creates a larger volume of revenue for regional cashiers through taxes directly administered by AVT, to which must be added those accrued by Internet gaming activities. It is collected by the government and then passed on to communities. According to data from the Treasury, in the first half of the year, Generalitat raised about 19.5 million euros for what are popularly known as slot machines; this is a figure reaching 45 million in the autonomous community as a whole.
Fees for bingo activity in Alicante province also increased, reaching 4.8 million compared to 1.5 million revenue in the first half of last year, representing a significant increase of 225%. Similarly, this increase was recorded at the regional level, where Generalitat rose from 3.3 million to 11 million in collections.
The same happened with the odds tied to the casinos, but in this case the percentage of growth was slightly lower. The same sources state that it reached 1.6 million with an increase of 52% in the province, while 2.6 million people gathered at the regional level, a figure representing an increase of 84% compared to the same period of the previous year. .