- BULGARIA'S 10% CORPORATE AND PERSONAL INCOME TAX RATES ARE THE LOWEST IN EU
- CONSERVATIVE FISCAL POLICY AND LOW GOVERNMENT DEBT-TO-GDP
- HARMONIZED NATIONAL LEGISLATION WITH EU
- EU SINGLE MARKET ACCESS
INVESTMENT INCENTIVES
- Rapid lane for administrative services (forinvestors class AandB)
- Individual administrative services (for class A)
- Acquisition of ownership or limited property rights on properties without tender or competition (for class A and B)
- Financial support for the construction of technical infrastructure elements (for class A or for two projects class B in an industrial zone)
- Financial support for training or acquiring professional qualification for the newly employed (only for investments in the high-tech activities or in the municipalities with a high unemployment rate-for class A and class B)
- Financial support for partial reimbursement of the investor's compulsory social security contributions for newly recruited employees (for class A and B)
Sustainable economic policy since 1997 achieved by a broad consensus over the cornerstones and it continues to dominate reforms at present.
A currency board establishes a fixed exchange rate (to EUR) regime under which the Central Bank cannot finance the government or the commercial banks. Bulgaria will keep the fixed rate until the adoption of the Euro, which is part of its EU accession agreement.
Bulgaria is a member country of NATO since 2004 and EU since 2007.
Bulgaria's 10% corporate and personal income tax rates are the lowest flat rates in EU. A quick comparison, Romania holds 16% corporate and personal income tax rates, Serbia - 15%, and the Czech Republic respectively 19% and 15%.
According Eurostat data:
- The 2018 GDP of Bulgaria -3,1 is higher than EU-27 - 2,1;
- The public debt went down from over 100% of GDP in 1997 to 20,2% (2019-Q3) -the second lowest in EU 27; The EU 27 average for the same period: 79,5%.
- The third lowest ratio in EU of government debt-to-GDP was recorded again in Bulgaria (28.9%) next only to Estonia's and Luxembourg's according to Eurostat's 2019 - Q3 report.
In the 2019 Global Competitiveness Index (GCI) of the World Economic Forum in Davos (www. weforum.org), Bulgaria keeps its ranking as 49th (out of 141) compared to Serbia (72th), Romania (51th), Greece (59th), Turkey (61th), and Poland (37th). Bulgaria keeps its best scores in "Macroeconomic environment" (90 out of 100) which is close to Europe and North America average.
In the 2019 "Doing Business" report of the World Bank (www.doingbusiness.org), Bulgaria ranks 59th out of 190 countries, compared to Turkey (43th), Hungary (53th), Greece (72th), Italy (51th) and Romania (52th).
The best scores that Bulgaria receives, along with Germany and France are as economy set best regulatory performance in time to import and in "Starting business" 85 points out of 100.
Since 1996, the index published in Economic Freedom of the World Report (www.freethe- world.com) by the Fraser Institute (Vancouver, Canada) has been measuring the degree to which the policies and institutions support economic freedom. In the 2019 edition of the Index Bulgaria ranks 37th (out of 159). Bulgaria keeps its best scores as "Sound money" (9.4 score), "Regulation" (7.7) and "Freedom to trade internationally" (8.1).
