Bulgaria Budget surplus up to 1.09B leva in May, below forecast
Bulgaria’s Finance Ministry said that the consolidated Budget surplus grew to 1.09 billion leva, or 1.3 per cent of the forecast gross domestic product (GDP), at the end of May, up from 1.07 billion leva a month earlier.
The surplus represented an improvement of 2.4 per cent of GDP compared to the same period of 2014, when the consolidated Budget deficit was 888.6 million leva, but the five-month figure fell short of the Finance Ministry’s forecast surplus of 1.15 billion leva.
The ministry said that the high surplus this year was the result of improved revenue collection, while spending remained roughly unchanged compared to 2014. It offered no explanation for the lower-than-expected surplus figure.
After four months of surplus growth, the trend is expected to reverse in June, with the Finance Ministry forecasting the six-month surplus at 850 million leva (one per cent of GDP), which would make it the highest surplus at the half-year mark since 2008, the last year before the global recession hit the country. Last year, Bulgaria had a deficit of 996 million leva at the end of June.
In the first five months of the year, the state Budget had a surplus of 561.6 million leva and the EU funds surplus was 529.5 million leva. Bulgaria’s contribution to the EU budget for the first three months of 2015 was 450.9 million leva.
Consolidated Budget revenue in January-May was 13.82 billion leva, an improvement of 17.3 per cent compared to the same period of last year. Tax revenues were up nine per cent compared to the first five months of last year, at 10.28 billion leva.
Budget spending was 12.73 billion leva in January-May.
(Photo: Michael Faes/sxc.hu)