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November 22nd, 2008
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BONDS The Czech Banking Association is lobbying to retain the tax-free status of mortgage-bond yields, which is set to be revoked beginning next year by the public-finance reforms, Hospodářské noviny reported Sept. 25. The association says ending the exemption could lead to a half-point rise in interest rates.

FUNDS The Czech Republic lags behinds many of the European Union’s other new member states in its drawing of structural funds for 2004–06, the EU said Sept. 24. The country had only capitalized on 46 percent of the funds available to it; only Cyprus and Latvia were worse, at 41 percent and 45 percent, respectively. Funds can be drawn until 2008.
AAA Shares of the used-car dealer AAA Auto began selling on the Prague Stock Exchange Sept. 24 at 2 euros ($2.80/55 Kč) each. It is the first initial public offering on the exchange this year, and should net the company some 39 million euros toward its expansion. The company was set to begin trading on the Budapest exchange Sept. 26.
POWER Electricity prices will rise approximately 10 percent for households and small companies next year, the country’s dominant power utility, ČEZ, has announced. Larger companies will face an even larger increase, up to 25 percent. The prices were determined by trading on the country’s new energy exchange. The rise could have catastrophic effects for small businesses, the Economic Chamber warned.
ČEZ ČEZ plans to extend the operating lives of four of its older coal-fired power plants until 2020, the company said Sept. 21. It had been planning to shutter the plants between 2010 and 2015. The company has no other option, it said, after it was rebuked by Czech Coal on the construction of a new plant in north Bohemia.
INCENTIVES The Economic Chamber has called on the government to cancel its practice of granting investment incentives to foreign businesses, Chamber President Jaromír Drábek has told the Czech News Agency. The incentives damage local entrepreneurs by distorting the market, the chamber says. The Industry and Trade Ministry supports Drábek’s views but says it cannot make further policy changes due to the current political environment.
REFORMS As expected, the government’s public-finance reforms passed the Senate Sept. 19 and will now move to President Vacláv Klaus for his signature. The reforms are designed to reduce the budget deficit by setting a 15 percent flat tax on income and raising the lower value-added tax, among other measures.
BUDGET The Cabinet approved the draft of the 2008 state budget Sept. 19, which projects next year’s deficit to sit at 70.8 billion Kč, compared to 91.3 billion Kč this year. The budget’s basic parameters have not changed since it was first discussed earlier this month, Finance Minister Miroslav Kalousek told journalists. The draft should move to Parliament by month’s end.


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