Individuals in the Republic of Moldova have spent more than one billion lei this year purchasing advertising services from international platforms such as Meta, Facebook, Google and YouTube. At the same time, these companies have paid more than 311 million lei in VAT to the state budget, according to Finance Minister Victoria Belous.
Speaking on TV8’s “Cutia Neagră” programme, the minister said that international platforms are registered as VAT payers with the State Tax Service and pay the tax on services purchased by individuals in Moldova. When advertising services are purchased by legal entities, the responsibility for declaring VAT lies with the companies themselves.
According to Victoria Belous, the total amount paid into the state budget this year by the platforms under review exceeds 311 million lei. The largest payment made by an international platform without a representative office in Moldova amounted to more than 81 million lei, while the smallest was just a few hundred lei.
The minister also explained that individuals in Moldova purchased services worth more than one billion lei from these platforms this year. The total figure is even higher when purchases made by companies are included.
“I cannot provide a separate figure for each platform because we only see the overall amount, which also includes IT services,” Victoria Belous said.