The Treasury wants you to pay a ‘complementary fee’ to the gasoline STPS in 2021

The new quota’s objective is to increase tax collection of the STPS on fuels when the price of oil is low, following that dependence.

MEXICO CITY (El Financiero) – Although the Ministry of Finance and Public Credit (SHCP) did not propose a tax increase, in the Miscellaneous Fiscal 2021, it presents the creation of a new “complementary quota” that would apply to the Special Tax on Production and Services (IEPS) quotas that consumers already pay in the purchase of gasoline and diesel.

The new quota’s objective is to increase the tax collection of the IEPS on fuels when the price of oil is low. At the same time, the Treasury will continue with its policy of protecting consumers’ purchasing power through fiscal stimuli.

The agency argued that the COVID-19 pandemic led to lower demand for crude oil, resulting in a lower sales price of crude oil and a reduction in fuel sales in 2020, which implied a decrease in the Federal Government’s revenue due to the drop in crude oil sales and the reduction in STPS revenue.

In this context, the Treasury considers it “opportune” to incorporate counter-cyclical instruments to strengthen public finances in the face of “disadvantageous” scenarios such as those observed in 2020 into the tax scheme of the STPS applicable to automotive fuels.

This will be achieved by applying complementary quotas to those provided in Article Two, section I, paragraph D, of the STPS Law, which would apply when fuel prices are lower than the base prices calculated by the Treasury.

In other words, consumers will pay an additional fee to the federal STPS fees, which, by 2020, are at 4.95 pesos per liter for Magna gasoline, 4.18 pesos per liter for Premium, and 5.44 pesos per liter for diesel 5.44.

The Treasury Department stated that “such measure does not imply an additional tax or surcharge, since it is only a modification to the quota based on the arithmetic operations that Congress will establish to adjust the quota according to the economic variables that the legislator defines.”

Thus, the fee in force as of January 1, 2021, will be adjusted to decrease or increase it, according to the variables contemplated in the regulation itself.

“In this way, public finances will be protected in the event of downward variations in crude prices, international references, and exchange rates, allowing the Mexican Government to meet the needs of the population. Likewise, in the event of upward variations in the price of crude, international references, and the exchange rate, Mexican households’ purchasing power will continue to be protected,” the Miscellaneous Fiscal Law states.

President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador reiterated during his morning conference this Thursday, September 10, that “what you can also be sure of is that they are not going to increase taxes in real terms and that every year before came the tax increases, modifications to the so-called fiscal miscellany. That is no longer happening. I can guarantee you that the so-called miscellaneous tax bill or the Income Law initiative is the same as last year. There are no modifications and no tax increases”.