A 5% tax on remittances from the United States opens the door to informal channels such as encomenderos and opaque operations with cryptocurrencies, warns the Mexican Institute of Finance Executives.
“The sending of remittances would continue on non -traditional alternate roads such as the so -called encomenderos and the use of cryptocurrencies, carrying a higher cost and risk for which it sends them,” said Gabriela Gutiérrez Mora, president of the body.
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Last week he began the discussion in the United States Congress of the Remittance Tax sent by natural persons who are not American citizens, even when they have a resident visa and pay taxes on their income.
The debate was suspended on Friday as part of the general negotiation of the financial package proposed by the Executive.
Víctor Manuel Herrera Espinosa, president of the National Committee of Economic Studies of the IMEF, said that the migrant will continue in the United States and send money, but “it will no longer do it through traditional channels, but that it leaves as it was before through the encomenderos.”
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“The encomenderos go to the airport, receive the money from the people who want to send it, transport it in cash to Mexico to the limit that allows you to put without declaring in Mexico. Subsequently, relatives pay a commission to the person, who brought the dollars,” he said.
“All of that is extremely expensive, so the remittance system is more than 25 years ago,” he said.
Another way will be with the use of technology, such as cryptocurrencies, even, he added, there are already companies that are trying to send remittances from the United States to Mexico.
“This has an additional risk and cost for those who send them. If the tax passes, the sending of remittances will be by an informal channel of the encomenderos or to the less transparent channel of the remittances,” he said.
“It is uncertain if this tax will be approved as proposed, but it is clear that there is an unequal treatment among foreigners who legally reside in the American Union and who comply with their fiscal obligations, of those who reside irregularly in that country and do not pay taxes on their perceptions,” said IMEF president.
He recalled that there is a differentiated treatment between remittances sent through the banking system and remittances, which can unleash legal conflicts in case of tax approval.
“If this initiative is approved, reconfigures the remittance market that has been developed in the United States,” said IMEF president.
Gabriela Gutiérrez Mora explained that communities depend on remittances to subsist: “Remittances represent 24 percent of El Salvador’s GDP and more than 3 percent of India and Mexico’s GDP,” he said.
Remittances represent 10 to 14% of Oaxaca state GDP, Zacatecas, Michoacán, Guerrero and Chiapas.
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He indicated that it is also very possible that the volume of remittances sent from the United States is reduced in the coming months due to persecution of illegal migrants.
“This would significantly affect the local economies of several states of the Republic, since remittances are the primary source of income that stimulates consumption,” he added.
