UK challenge on FTT is rejected

摘要

Britain's legal challenge to a financial transactions tax was rejected by Europe's highest court, dealing another blow to attempts to shield London's financial centre from the influence of Brussels. The ruling throws out legal action intended to prevent a group of 11 countries, including Germany and France, from introducing a trading tax, and was seized on by critics as evidence of the British government's impotence in fighting its corner in Europe. Britain, where financial services account for a 10th of the economy, making the sector one of the country's biggest tax generators, had argued trading in London would be affected, even though it would be outside the zone of a tax that is anyway likely to be scaled back.