Politics

As the House tax bill hits the wires, leaked details of the Senate's tax bill are coming out...

There will be 7 tax brackets - considerably more complex than the 3 brackets in the House bill

Senate tax legislation will keep seven tax brackets but alter the rates, GOP Sen. John Hoeven tells reporters.

 

Hoeven says the brackets will be set at 7%, 12%, 22.5%, 25%, 32.5%, 35%, and 38.5% (lower than the current top tax rate of 39.6%)

Brexit talks yielded no breakthrough on the financial settlement, and discussions focused on the issue of citizens’ rights, where the two sides are hoping for progress, an EU official told reporters.

Bloomberg notes that the anonymous official added that no breakthrough was expected on the bill, as that would require high-level political input.

The drums of war are beating at a deafening pace: with Saudi Arabia ordering its citizens to immediately leave Lebanon on Thursday, just a few hours later Kuwait joined in.

According to the Kuwait News Agency, citing a foreign ministry statement, Kuwait citizens currently in Lebanon are urged to leave the country immediately.

The statement said the order is due to the "circumstances experienced by Lebanon at the moment, as well as a precautionary measure against any negative impact that might take place."

Confirming reports from earlier this week that the Senate GOP tax plan would delay the corporate tax cut for (at least) one year, a move that would strip the proposed tax reform of its most potent benefit, moments ago the Wapo reported that in a few hours, Senate Republicans will propose delaying a cut in the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 20 percent until 2019.

After a wave of GOP defections in recent days and waffling on timing, Goldman's economics team apparently still sees a 65% chance of a tax reform bill being enacted by "early 2018," but warns that the final bill may look nothing like the one recently proposed by the House.