Previous Story
Government expects deficit of $ 4,380 million in 2018
Posted On 04 Oct 2018
Ecuadornews:
The government’s budget deficit continues to fall according to the Central Bank’s forecasts. The country will end the year with a deficit of $ 4,380 million, a less dramatic figure than that of – $ 6,142 million with which it closed 2017.
Meanwhile, yesterday Finance Minister Richard Martínez assured that from January to September, the deficit was – $ 1,230 million; which means $ 1,664 million less deficit compared to the same period of the previous year.
According to Walter Spurrier, director of Weekly Analysis, despite the goal of the deficit, the Government does not show signs of expecting a drop in spending, but rather it increases with respect to 2017.
In addition, the Government expects an increase of important income. The data was analyzed yesterday during a workshop called “The challenges of adjustment” that took place in Quito.
Is that according to the latest figures displayed by the Government, 2017 revenues were $ 18,170 million, while for 2018 expected $ 21,261 million ($ 3,000 million more). The expense goes from $ 24,312 million to $ 25,740 million; an increase of $ 1,428 million.
The greater expense could be explained due to a series of payments left by the previous Government (retirees, oil debts, among others).
The optimism that the government handles with respect to income is also striking. The sources for this issue could be in the remission as in the VAT increase, explained the analyst.
On the subject, Minister Martinez has said that he maintains the goal of $ 600 million for the referral, and that he expects the bulk of the payment agreements to arrive in December.
On the subject of VAT, the minister said that for the moment there is no analysis in that sense, although the authorities do not close to any possibility. He explained that at the moment they are working on the optimization of subsidies.
He said that the Regulation for the Development Law will be ready in 15 days and with this the arrival of investment can be operationalized.
He said that the 2019 budget will be presented at the beginning of November to the National Assembly. At the end, announced that some $ 1.3 billion in credit will be delivered from the public bank to seek productive economic reactivation. (I)
