Taiwan's Ministry of Finance is consulting on draft regulations for the introduction of an incentive to promote business investment, which includes a reduction of the 5% retained earnings tax and possible refund for qualifying investments made.

The incentive is to apply for after-tax earnings generated in 2018 and future years that are invested in qualifying assets within three years after the respective year of earnings (e.g. by the end of 2021 for earnings generated in 2018). The minimum investment amount per year is TWD 1 million and qualifying investments include investments in the following for self-production or business use:

• The construction/purchase of buildings, including expansions;
• Machinery, equipment, tools, vehicles, ships, aircraft, communications hardware and software, and other tangible assets for operation; and
• Technology, including business rights, copyrights, patents, trademark rights, designs or models, secret methods, proprietary technologies, and capital expenditures for various franchise rights.

In any case, qualifying investments do not include land purchases or non-capital expenditures on equipment.

The consultation ends on 2 December 2019 and it expected that the regulations will be enacted before the end of the year.