MANILA : The Philippine central bank on Friday released revised projections for the current account and balance of payments this year and for 2022, reflecting it said the global economy’s recovery as well as lingering pandemic-related risks.
The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) now expects the country’s current account this year to post a deficit of US$4 billion, or 1per cent of gross domestic product, revising its projection from a surplus equivalent to 0.9per cent of GDP.
For next year, it projected a current account deficit of US$9.9 billion, or 2.3per cent of GDP, wider than its previous deficit forecast equivalent to 0.3per cent of GDP.
The balance of payments (BOP) is now projected to yield a narrower surplus of US$1.6 billion, or 0.4per cent of GDP, this year, compared with a previous estimate of 1.1per cent.
The BOP surplus in 2022 is expected to be even narrower at US$700 million, or 0.2per cent of GDP, from a previous forecast equivalent to 0.4per cent of GDP.
“The latest BOP assessment for 2021 factors in pockets of optimism amid encouraging economic outturns in recent months on the one hand, and the continued high uncertainty from pandemic-related challenges on the other hand,” the BSP said in a statement.
But overall, it said the latest set of projections took into account a global economic recovery that is broadly on track and indications that the spread of the highly transmissible COVID-19 Delta variant has been contained domestically.
The BSP, however, trimmed its year-end projections for gross international reserves to US$111 billion and US$112 billion next year, from US$114 billion and US$115 billion, respectively, to factor in some foreign loan repayments.
Cash remittances by Filipinos overseas, a key pillar of the consumption-driven domestic economy, were expected to grow 6per cent this year and 4per cent next year, reflecting rising demand for Filipino workers.
(Reporting by Neil Jerome Morales and Enrico Dela Cruz; Editing by Ed Davies)
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