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8.7.2021 7 INTERNATIONAL NEWS GERMAN Finance Minister Olaf Scholz said on Wednesday he does not expect hurdles to moving ahead with a planned global tax reform at a G20 meeting in Venice this weekend. "Everything will happen very quick- ly now," Scholz, who is running as So- cial Democrat chancellor candidate in Germany's elections in September, told Reuters in an interview. "e goal is very ambitious: we want to have everything ready already so that it becomes international practice in 2023," he added. Last week, 130 countries, representing more than 90% of global GDP, backed the biggest changes to cross-border corporate tax in more than a generation with new rules on where companies are taxed and a tax rate of at least 15%. e package goes to G20 finance min- isters next to give political endorsement at a meeting on Friday and Saturday in Venice. Tax havens, to which some global corporations have moved their profits, would lose out. "We are talking about a lot of addition- al money for Europe and for Germany," Scholz said. "It's really about billions," he added, without giving exact figures. "en the main thing is to make sure we end the practice of tax avoidance that has crept in over the last years and decades," he said. "We will put an end to that. e tax-cutting race will come to an end." Nine countries that did not sign the global tax overhaul backed by 130 oth- ers were the low-tax EU members Ire- land, Estonia and Hungary as well as Peru, Barbados, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Sri Lanka, Nigeria and Kenya. "I am convinced that in the end we will manage to get European countries to all agree on these rules together," Scholz said. "From my point of view, they would apply in any case." Scholz described the global minimum tax as a breakthrough and the biggest reform in decades. e minimum corporate tax does not require countries to set their rates at the agreed floor but gives other coun- tries the right to apply a top-up levy to the minimum on companies' income coming from a country that has a low- er rate. If a German corporation abroad paid only 2% on its profits, for example, it could be challenged in the future: "en we'll just take the rest," Scholz said. German Finance Minister Scholz says global tax reform "will happen very quickly" EU hikes growth forecasts for euro area, warns on the delta variant spread THE economic outlook has improved for the euro zone, according to the Eu- ropean Commission's latest forecasts on Wednesday, but the institution warned that the delta variant is a "stark remind- er" that the pandemic is not over. e executive arm of the EU had pro- jected in May a 4.3% GDP rate for the euro area in 2021, followed by a 4.4% GDP rate in 2022. Now, the commis- sion has updated its forecasts and is ex- pecting a 4.8% growth rate this year, and 4.5% for 2022. In comparison, the European Central Bank said in June that the euro area should grow 4.6% in 2021 and 4.7% next year. "e EU economy is set to see its fast- est growth in decades this year, fueled by strong demand both at home and globally and a swifter-than-expected reopening of services sectors since the spring," Paolo Gentiloni, the EU com- missioner for the economy, said in a statement. Based on the latest forecasts, the com- mission expects the euro area to return to its pre-crisis levels in the last quarter of this year — meaning one quarter ear- lier than expected. However, Gentiloni also said: "Cru- cially, we must redouble our vaccina- tion efforts, building on the impressive progress made in recent months: the spread of the Delta variant is a stark reminder that we have not yet emerged from the shadow of the pandemic." e latest economic forecasts come at a time when policymakers are increas- ingly worried about surging Covid-19 infections. In France, for instance, the government has raised the possibility of a fourth wave in late July — something that the country's finance minister de- scribed as "the single thing that might jeopardize the economic recovery." According to the latest forecasts, France could grow at a rate of 6% this year from an earlier estimate of 5.7%. Looking at Europe's traditional eco- nomic engine, Germany, the commis- sion is now expecting a GDP rate of 3.6% in 2021, versus 3.4% estimated in May. Tourism revival e commission also mentioned that "there is evidence of a revival in in- tra-EU tourist activity, which should further benefit from the entry into ap- plication of the new EU Digital COVID Certificate as of 1 July." is document allows people which have tested negative for the virus, have recovered from it, or have been fully vaccinated, to travel more easily within the 27-member bloc. is is critical for tourism-dependent economies, namely Greece, Spain, Italy and Portugal. Spain is projected to grow by 6.2% this year, the second highest growth rate in the bloc. e commission noted that there has been more hiring in recent weeks in Spain and that business and consumer sentiment has also improved in the EU's fourth largest market.

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