Promoting Tax Neutrality in the Financial Sector this paper discusses the issue of tax neutrality in the financial sector. Under a tax neutral environment, the tax rate does not affect how companies conduct business or how customers decide on choosing products and services. When tax is not neutral, this may result in a tax arbitrage wherein one attempts to profit on price differences on the same product resulting from different rates of taxes. This practice distorts the financial markets and unfair advantage to the product or company favored by the tax treatment. Some of the identified cross-sectoral tax issues that can be used for arbitraging tax are deposit accounts and long-term investments. While it is recognized that it is difficult to achieve the goal of complete tax neutrality, minimizing and/or reducing variations in the taxation of the financial sector may still be worth looking into. Taxing comparable products/institutions similarly may encourage savings and discourage tax arbitrage which could contribute in further promoting the development of the financial sector. HB6229: Reorganizing and Strengthening the Philippine Statistical System This paper explains the recently passed House Bill 6229 entitled “Philippine Statistical Act of 2012”. The bill seeks to reorganize and rationalize the present set-up of the Philippine Statistical System (PSS) and address the fragmented statistical system by gearing the PSS towards a high level of coordination and integration of statistical data between and among agencies of the government and the private sector. The reform is geared towards the strengthening of the system by providing a sound legal mandate and structure that will strengthen the present set-up of the PSS coordinating system.