DOF letter to Jack Ma over fake PHL tax stamps sold on Alibaba

Finance Secretary Carlos “Sonny” Dominguez III has written to Alibaba founder and executive chairman Jack Ma taking issue with fake Philippine tax stamps sold on the Chinese e-commerce giant.

Screenshots of the Alibaba listings were also included in the letter sent in light of the alleged use of counterfeit tax stamps by Mighty Corporation, an accusation first raised in January.

"We would like to respectfully request that Alibaba cooperate with the government of the Republic of the Philippines by immediately stopping such advertisement and prohibiting similar advertisements in the future," Dominguez wrote.

The Finance Secretary explained that advertising and selling fake tax stamps "in the open" gave tax evaders more room to "evade excise tax on cigarettes."

It also made it harder for the Bureau of Internal Revenue and Bureau of Customs to collect taxes and duties and curb excise tax evasion.

Screenshots of the fake stamps, sold from Guangzhou and Shenzhen, China, showed that they were categorized under "Packaging Labels" and sold for $0.01 per piece with a minimum order of 1,000 pieces.

Meikei Printing Co. Ltd. supposedly prints the labels, as evidenced by the watermarks on the prints in the listing. —Rie Takumi/JST, GMA News