National Tax Service Targets Tax Evasion in Inflation, Stocks, and Real Estate... 625.2 Billion Won Collected in Six Months [Work Report]

NTS Reports Key Achievements for First Half and Outlines Core Future Initiatives
Collected 319.5 Billion Won on Price Manipulation, 257.6 Billion Won on Stock Markets, and 48.1 Billion Won in Real Estate
Pushing for Integrated Collection of Non-

The National Tax Service has intensively investigated tax evasion activities that undermine fair growth—including price inflation-induced tax evasion, unfair tax evasion in the stock market, and real estate tax evasion—over the past six months, collecting over 620 billion won in additional taxes. Going forward, the National Tax Service plans to continue its stringent response to anti-social tax evasion and tax delinquencies. In addition, it will establish a system for verifying actual conditions regarding 130 trillion won in arrears by integrating the collection of non-tax revenue to improve fiscal efficiency and by fully operating a delinquency management team of about 10,000 members.

On July 15, the National Tax Service announced that it had reported these major achievements for the first half of the year as well as the key upcoming tasks during a government work briefing held at the Blue House State Guest House.

Haeyoung Park, Deputy Commissioner of the National Tax Service, is explaining the major achievements of the National Tax Service in the first half of the year and the key upcoming tasks at the Government Sejong Complex. National Tax Service

Haeyoung Park, Deputy Commissioner of the National Tax Service, stated, "Over the past six months, the National Tax Service has eliminated privileges, unfairness, and abnormalities, upholding tax justice, and has listened closely to the public to correct irrationalities on the ground. Through proactive and active tax administration support, we have helped drive the recovery and growth of the people’s economy." He emphasized, "Tax evasion behaviors that impair fair growth, such as those encouraging inflation, unfair practices in the stock market, and real estate tax evasion, have been strictly investigated to ensure substantial penalties."

◆ Thorough Investigation of Anti-Social Tax Evasion = In practice, the National Tax Service launched its first strategic audit under the new administration in July last year, targeting stock market-related unfair tax evasion such as 'tunneling' firms (which siphon off assets and profits) and 'stock price manipulation' groups, areas that had not been comprehensively scrutinized before. Starting in May this year, a second round of intensive audits focused again on stock price manipulation, tunneling, and illegal investment tip channels. These efforts have resulted in the collection of 257.6 billion won in the past six months.

Additionally, the agency collected 39.8 billion won by uncovering cases where individuals secretly received gifted funds from their parents to purchase expensive apartments and evaded gift taxes, as well as cases where multiple homeowners fraudulently transferred the title of lower-priced homes to relatives or acquaintances and unfairly applied single-household non-taxation benefits to capital gains from high-value property sales. Especially noteworthy are the 319.5 billion won imposed on 114 businesses—including those involved in monopolistic or oligopolistic practices, price collusion, food processing, agricultural and marine products, daily necessities, and restaurant franchises—that reported excessive profits without properly declaring their income.

The National Tax Service has strengthened its pursuit of large and habitual tax delinquents and has actively signed collection cooperation agreements with overseas tax authorities to thoroughly track and recover assets hidden both domestically and abroad. Over the past six months, the amount of overseas hidden assets recovered reached 40.4 billion won.

In the second half of the year, the National Tax Service will thoroughly investigate tax evasion related to price collusion and hoarding (which fuels price instability), unfair tax practices in the stock market that damage order in capital markets, and offshore tax evasion that causes capital outflows and foreign exchange instability—all of which threaten the stability of the national economy—until normalcy returns to the market. Deputy Commissioner Park stated, "Cases where individuals use ultra-high-priced residences or supercars under a corporate name as their own property, provoking public outrage, will be uncovered without exception and the illicit funds collected." He also stressed, "We will utilize all available tools to recover unreported income from real estate tax evasion practices that undermine market order—such as property purchases circumventing government loan regulations, irregular transactions following the reintroduction of heavy taxes on multiple homeowners, and misuse of business loans."

◆ Integrating Non-Tax Revenue Collection With National Tax Collection Expertise = The National Tax Service also aims to evolve into an 'integrated fiscal revenue agency' beyond its traditional tax collection role. The agency is pushing to unify the management systems to efficiently handle arrears in non-tax revenues such as traffic fines and administrative penalties, currently managed under about 300 different laws. In the preliminary stage, the plan is to start verifying delinquents for police-issued fines.

Furthermore, while actively supporting the legislative process for the "Act on Collection and Management of Non-Tax Revenue Arrears" proposed in February this year, the agency will conduct status checks using information on delinquents obtained through inter-agency financial business agreements, aiming to build a 'delinquent-by-delinquent database.' Additionally, when the law goes into effect, the National Tax Service will launch an 'integrated management system' to connect all agencies’ non-tax revenue billing and arrears data in real time with the national tax administration system, while also expanding dedicated teams and personnel.

◆ 10,000-Strong Delinquency Management Team to Verify 130 Trillion Won in Arrears = On July 8, the National Tax Service inaugurated a tax and non-tax revenue delinquency management team of about 6,000 people at 133 tax offices nationwide, with tax office chiefs, support staff, accompanying civil servants, and verification officers in attendance. The team aims to verify all 1.34 million national tax delinquents and 4.24 million non-tax revenue delinquents using tax offices as local headquarters. The agency plans to hire an additional 4,000 people in the second half of the year, deploying 10,000 verification personnel starting in October this year.

Kwanghyun Lim, Commissioner of the National Tax Service, is giving a lecture to the National Tax and Non-Tax Revenue Delinquency Management Team at Kintex in Goyang on the 3rd. National Tax Service

Deputy Commissioner Park stated, "Through this, we expect to maximize the ‘one action, five outcomes’ effect of the delinquency management team—achieving tax justice, securing national finances, creating productive jobs, resolving overdue accounts comprehensively, and identifying those eligible for welfare support. We will enhance performance by providing customized verification, such as phone consultations or on-site checks with tax officers depending on the type and amount of arrears, while strictly passing on heinous, large-scale delinquents to investigative teams and thoroughly supporting subsequent measures including welfare support for those in hardship due to livelihood struggles."

The National Tax Service also seeks to accelerate transformation in all areas of tax administration through artificial intelligence (AI). The goal is to realize ‘K-AI Tax Administration’—leading innovation in taxpayer services, fair taxation, and efficiency by prioritizing AI adoption in high public-value services. Based on AI chatbot filing guides, ‘Hometax’ AI search, and AI phone consultation services released this year, the agency plans to dramatically improve taxpayer convenience, ultimately enabling people to have AI automatically prepare tax return forms ‘without needing to visit the tax office or even know where it is.’

Commissioner Kwanghyun Lim stated, "Over the past six months, removing privileges and unfairness and listening to the people has led to visible results in the field. In the second half, the National Tax Service will deliver achievements that exceed the public’s expectations, supporting a great leap forward for ‘an irreplaceable Republic of Korea.’"

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.