Ayman Fadilat - Amman

"The worst stage of the stock exchange during the past ten years, and unfortunately next year warns of further deterioration with the introduction of income tax on the profits of trading shares," the words the oldest investor on the ASE investors.

Al-Sabaini describes Abu-Jamil al-Qasrawi himself as the oldest investor in the bourse. The financial market has entered the stock market and has been a stock investor for 40 years.

Al-Haj Khalid Barkawi, a stockbroker for 15 years, agrees with Abu Jamil that the financial situation of the market is going from bad to worse.

"The bad luck" next year on the Amman Stock Exchange is the introduction of the Income Tax Law on speculative profits in equities, which will lead to the flight of the rest of the local and foreign investors, Barkawi told Al Jazeera.net.

Abu Jamil the oldest investors in the stock market (Al Jazeera)

The lowest decline since 2004
Investor Fouad Marashdeh told Al Jazeera.net that the general index of the Amman Stock Exchange closed at 1,700 points on Thursday, the lowest since 2004, indicating that the market has lost its competitive advantage and investor appetite. He added that he started investing five years ago with a portfolio of 140,000 dollars , And now amounted to 40 thousand dollars.

He warned against the risk of low trading volume, which will lead to the escape of funds and portfolios of foreign and Arab investment, and pointed out that a number of American, Palestinian and Kuwaiti companies ended their work on the Amman Stock Exchange during the month.

What does stop trading mean ?
The brokerage firms operating in the Jordanian financial market announced the suspension of trading on the stock exchange for two hours on Wednesday and Thursday as a symbolic protest message to draw the attention of decision makers to the seriousness of what is happening in the financial market.

The head of the Emerging Markets for Financial and Investment Services, Saqr Abdul Fattah, describes what is happening in the financial market as a "crime against the homeland" through unofficial decisions. The market suffers from weakness in circulation and successive losses for several years. Unfortunately, the new income tax law will eliminate what remains of Investors and companies.

Director of brokerage firm talks about the reality of the financial market (Al Jazeera)

The danger of applying the law, according to Abdel Fattah, lies in the flight of foreign investment funds that started to leave the market and the loss of the local investor as a result of fear of the expected losses, and thus the closure of brokerage companies and the layoffs of thousands of employees.

The Government's Position
According to Information Minister Jumana Ghneimat, the significant decline in the financial market and the Amman Stock Exchange has not escaped the attention of the Jordanian government, noting that the government has turned to this issue, and instructed to regulate the issue of new income tax on shares.

Ghanim tried to explain the misunderstanding about the tax issue, saying at a news conference on Thursday that anyone who owns shares does not have to pay the tax, but only the imposition of the tax on trading in shares, where the new law subjected the profits of trading shares to tax starting from the beginning of next year, while The owner of the shares is exempt from tax for the purposes of a specific strategy.

The Association of Financial Services Companies called on the government to stop tax work under the amended law on income tax to protect the national economy.

The market value of the Amman Stock Exchange (ASE) has declined by about $ 1.4 billion in the past three weeks.