The country's continued economic expansion in 2023, measured as the gross domestic product (GDP), eased sharply to only 5.6 percent in the final quarter and came even lower than the revised output expansion of 6 percent in the third quarter.
The Philippines Statistics Authority on Tuesday announced an upward revision in the third quarter economic growth data, lifting gross domestic production expansion to 6.0 percent in the July-September quarter from an earlier estimate of 5.9 percent.
The Philippines is seen to have missed its goal of boosting local output expansion averaging at least 6 percent in 2023, having grown at a slower rate of only 4.9 percent in the fourth quarter last year, analysts at Moody's Analytics said on Monday.
The U.S. economy grew faster than expected in the fourth quarter amid strong consumer spending, and shrugged off dire predictions of a recession after the Federal Reserve aggressively raised interest rates, with growth for the full year coming in at 2.5 percent.
The Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) has clarified Revenue Regulation 16-2023 which imposes a withholding tax on the gross remittance of electronic marketplace (e-marketplace) operators and digital financial services providers (DFSPs) to sellers/merchants.