Philipsburg:--- Minister of Finance Roland Tuitt told reporters on Friday that his Ministry is busy with the banks on St. Maarten to see how they would implement the FACTA Disposal Rules which were supposed to take effect on June 1. Minister Tuitt said just recently the US Department of Treasury issued a press release which states that they are engaged with more than 50 countries around the world to improve the international tax compliance. Tuitt said the FACTA law was approved in 2010 by Congress and it is mainly to target US citizens that do not pay their taxes by using foreign accounts.
Tuitt further explained that St. Maarten will be working closely with the Netherlands who is currently negotiating with the US treasury regarding the implementation of the FACTA. Tuitt said the US treasury expects to conclude their discussions with the Netherlands by the end of this year.
In unrelated news, the Finance Minister said that St. Maarten just recently received a positive rating with Moody's. Tuitt said that St. Maarten got a BAA1 rating even though it's the first time country St. Maarten was rated while the Princess Juliana International Airport (PJIAE) also received a very good rating. He said this means that the economy on St. Maarten is considered to be stable.
Tuitt said having the CFT in place to monitor St. Maarten's finances and its budget process contributed to the positive rating the island received from Moody's. Moody's also assigned an A1 currency rating for St. Maarten; this Tuitt said is the maximum rating any country could receive, while they assigned an A2 foreign currency rating for the island. The Finance Minister said based on the ratings the island received, the island is in the same category as Trinidad and Mexico and higher than Barbados. He said even though this is good for the island the ratings next year should be even better because the government has quite a few projects they are working on while they are also working on improving institutions within the country.
