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View of Naver headquarters. (Photo = Naver) |
[Alpha Biz= Kim Jisun] It has been reported that Naver and Kakao paid around 540 billion KRW in corporate taxes in South Korea last year. Despite a decrease in corporate taxes due to factors such as the exclusion of affiliates, both companies have consistently paid taxes amounting to billions of KRW. In contrast, foreign platform companies such as Google Korea and Facebook Korea paid less than a tenth of the taxes.
According to the electronic disclosure system on Monday, Naver paid 390.2 billion KRW in corporate taxes last year, while Kakao paid 159 billion KRW, bringing the total for both companies to 549.2 billion KRW. In 2023, Naver paid 496.4 billion KRW and Kakao paid 168.4 billion KRW, totaling 664.8 billion KRW in corporate taxes for both.
The decrease in corporate taxes was due to a 1% reduction following recent tax reforms and the exclusion of some affiliates, which had an impact. For example, Naver excluded Naver Z from its affiliates last year, and Kakao reduced the number of affiliates from 137 in February to 120 by November.
Over the past five years, both companies have consistently paid corporate taxes between 500 billion to 600 billion KRW annually. Naver's corporate taxes ranged from 400 billion to 600 billion KRW, while Kakao's varied between 200 billion to 600 billion KRW.
Specifically, Naver paid 492.5 billion KRW in 2020, 648.7 billion KRW in 2021, 410.5 billion KRW in 2022, and 496.3 billion KRW in 2023. During the same period, Kakao paid 239.9 billion KRW in 2020, 646.1 billion KRW in 2021, 201.9 billion KRW in 2022, and 168.4 billion KRW in 2023.
AlphaBIZ Kim Jisun(stockmk2020@alphabiz.co.kr)
