Tsakalotos to submit report on 2019 tax cuts to PM in July

Greece's finance ministry will submit a report to Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras in July on the tax relief measures the government will implement in 2019, totaling 700 million euros, Finance Minister Euclid Tsakalotos said in an interview with state-run Athens-Macedonian News Agency, published on Tuesday.

“Already for 2019 we have 700 million euros for tax cuts which will appear in the draft budget in October,” he said in his first interview since the Eurogroup in Luxembourg.

“As to where these tax cuts will aim, the prime minister has asked us to submit a report in July on the pros and cons, about how each euro can stretch further,” he added.

Tsakalotos said tax reductions may affect the unified property tax ENFIA, social security contributions or some other economic burden.

Asked about the debt deal Greece got at the Eurogroup, the minister said it gave the government what it wanted. “And what we wanted was a 'clean pathway' for us and investors,” he said.

He admitted however that the primary surpluses demanded by Greece "are higher than what a left-wing economist and a left-wing finance minister would have wanted.”