On the last day of its 18th session, held October
22-27, the Standing Committee of the 10th National People's
Congress (NPC)
adopted amendments to the Corporate Law, allowing one-person
limited companies, Securities Law, allowing new regulations on
financial sector management, and Personal Income Tax Law, raising
its minimum payment threshold.
According to the newly-amended corporate law, one
person is allowed to apply to open a limited company with a minimum
capital of 100,000 yuan (US$12,345).
It also prescribes that the owner of the
single-person company should pay the investment capital in one go,
they cannot open a second single-person company and annual end of
year audits must be submitted to an accounting firm.
An owner who fails to prove that their assets are
independent from those of the company should take responsibility
for the company's losses, the amendment said.
The proposal was opposed by a number of lawmakers
during discussions, fearing that the owner of a one-person limited
company might take advantage of the company's assets for their own
use.
A study co-conducted by several legislative and
government bodies found that companies with features of one-person
limited companies already existed in China. These either had their
assets mostly owned by one of the shareholders, or owned by one
actual shareholder and a number of others who only hold stocks
nominally.
Amended securities law gives larger room for
development of stock market
The newly-amended Securities Law has more room for
the future development of the country's stock market, said former
chairman of China Securities Regulatory Commission Zhou
Zhengqing.
The new law has over 100 amendments, making it look
like a completely new law.
One of the most important amendments is that it
allows the State Council to stipulate new regulations regarding the
management and operation of different financial sectors including
banks, securities companies, trust companies and insurance firms,
according to Zhou.
It leaves room for future reforms in this field,
with the possibility of allowing different financial firms to enter
into others' areas.
Meanwhile, the new amendments also give the State
Council the final say on whether securities dealers are allowed to
provide loans to investors and state-owned companies or state-held
firms are allowed to trade shares on the stock market.
The newly-amended law includes articles on the
setting up of a state fund for the protection of investors.
Accordingly, the China Securities Investors Protection Foundation
Limited was established on September 29.
Moreover, the amended law has required securities
dealers to place clients' accounts separate from their own
accounts.
Personal income tax cutoff point raised to 1,600
yuan
The minimum payment threshold for monthly personal
income tax was increased from 800 to 1,600 yuan, effective from
January 1.
The amount is 100 yuan (US$12) higher than the
proposed 1,500 yuan cutoff point in the draft, which officials said
was an indication that lawmakers have considered opinions aired at
a previous public hearing.
"We learned from this hearing that people hoped the
cutoff point should be even higher," said Lou Jiwei, vice-minister
of finance.
"But in that case, fiscal revenue would decrease
too much and our capability to support the growth of the western
regions would be impaired," he said.
According to Lou, more than 50 percent of central
finance goes to transfer payments to less developed western
regions.
He said that raising the cutoff point from 800 to
1,500 yuan will result in more than 23 billion yuan (US$2.84
billion) being lost in revenue each year. Raising it to 1,600 yuan
would incur an additional annual loss of over 5 billion yuan
(US$617 million).
"After the adjustment of the cutoff point, the
number of taxpayers will drop by more than half. It will live up to
our legislative principle to care for the interests of low and
medium-income groups," said Lou.
The current standard of 800 yuan was instituted in
1993, when only around one percent of the employed people earned
more than that. In 2002, that proportion had jumped to around 52
percent.
(Xinhua News Agency October 28, 2005)