Cut-rate CGT stirs it up

The halving of capital gains tax in the last Budget has proved a boon for many people, from the home-owner who had rented out a flat and was alarmed at the size of the CGT bill she was facing when she decided to sell, to the directors of New Ireland who between them saved nearly £1 million last week when they sold their preferential Bank of Ireland shares.

Two issues have arisen, however, which some interested parties would like addressed sooner rather than later. The first is whether this 20 per cent rate can be sustained before the heavy hand of the European Commission intervenes and requires that the rate "harmonises" with the EU average, which is nearer to 30 per cent than 20.

The other is whether the CGT anomaly regarding overseas investment and life assurance contracts, which are still subject to the old 40 per cent, will remain in force until 2000 - when the derogation ends - or even be extended.

Last week's prompt selling by the New Ireland directors of their share options suggests that profit-taking may be the sensible course for anyone with CGT liable investments or property that they have been wanting to liquidate.

The idea of paying £540,000 instead of £1.08 million in CGT - the amount New Ireland's director, Mr Jack Casey, would have been liable for had the rate not changed, is a temptation few could resist.

The CGT issue has spread from the Dail to the airwaves with many claiming this was simply another concession to the already rich, and some economic commentators are suggesting that by April next year we may see a CGT rate that falls somewhere between the old and the new.

But whether this affects the amount paid on the proceeds of foreign investment and life assurance contracts is a matter that a company which launched its product here in recent months would like to see finally settled.

Mr David Healy, from Dublin, is the operations manager of Scottish Equitable International which operates out of the Luxembourg Financial Services Centre.

Mr Healy was in Dublin last week to meet investment advisers and financial planners to promote the gross roll-up investment fund which they launched here last autumn and to protest about the new CGT rate not being applied to his company's policies.

The SEI Global Secure Plus Fund is a medium- to long-term investment which invests either 100 per cent or 97.5 per cent of the capital into a basket of six international stock market tracker indices. Aimed at high net worth investors (the minimum investment is £15,000 sterling) unlike the more conventional tracker, it provides a quarterly lock-in facility which with the gross, roll-up nature of the fund means a potential for greater long-term profit than from a fund that is taxed internally and annually.

When the Third Life Directive was introduced a few years ago, which opened up the EU life industry to all members, it was decided that as a protection measure, the proceeds of non-Irish life assurance and investment policies would be subject to full Capital Gains Tax, without the benefit of any CGT price indexing.

When the Minister announced the halving of the CGT rate in December, companies like Scottish Equitable International mistakenly thought it would also apply to them.

The current policy "in which the CGT reduction does not apply to us, is clearly anti-European", says Mr Healy. "For the Finance Bill to restrict the reduction on CGT on non-Irish products suggests that an a la carte European approach is being taken by the Irish life assurance industry."

SEI, which works under some of the strictest banking and insurance regulation in the world - and was quick to distance itself from the offshore operations in the Isle of Man, has written to the Department of Finance, seeking clarification on the ruling. But in the meantime, the company admits that investors are reluctant to commit themselves.

"This is a long-term investment and the tax payable at the far end shouldn't be the deciding factor about its worth," says Mr Healy.

But he concedes that tax remains a high-profile issue in this country, and investors are conscious of the different tax implications of various products.