Robin Hood tax

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The Robin Hood Tax (UK-based campaigning group)

Founded	2010
Focus	Political lobbying, marshaling grassroots support.
Location	United Kingdom and international
Area served	International
Method	New media, social networking and creative marketing
Website	The Robin Hood Tax

The Robin Hood tax is a package of financial transaction taxes (FTT) proposed by a campaigning group of civil society non-governmental organizations (NGOs). Campaigners have suggested the tax could be implemented globally, regionally, or unilaterally by individual nations.

Conceptually similar to the Tobin tax (which was proposed for foreign currency exchange only), it would affect a wider range of asset classes including the purchase and sale of bonds, commodities, mutual funds, stocks, unit-trusts, and derivatives such as futures and options.

A United-Kingdom-based global campaign for the Robin Hood tax was launched on 10 February 2010^[1] and is being run by a coalition of over 50 charities and organisations, including Christian Aid, Comic Relief and UNICEF.^[2] The UK government published a response^[3] favouring instead bank levies and a financial activities tax, citing the International Monetary Fund's report to the June 2010 G20 meeting, "A Fair and Substantial Contribution by the Financial Sector".^[4] The Robin Hood tax campaign also supports both a Bank levy and a Financial Activity Tax, saying they are agnostic about the chosen mechanism providing it involves a sizeable transfer of wealth from the financial sector to the needy. However most of their campaigning efforts have focussed on the FTT variant.

By autumn 2011 the Robin Hood campaign had gained considerable extra momentum and support from prominent opinion formers, with a proposal from the European Commission to implement an FTT tax at EU level set to enter the legislative pipeline. The proposal, supported by eleven EU member states, was approved in the European Parliament in December 2012,^[5] and by the Council of the European Union in January 2013.^[6][7][8][9] The formal agreement on the details of the EU FTT still need to be decided upon and approved by the European Parliament.

In June 2023, the European Commission stated that 'the prospects of reaching an agreement' on the FTT, in the future were 'limited' adding there was 'little expectation that any proposal would be agreed in the short term.'^[10]