RP posts $255-million BOP surplus in March

MANILA, Philippines – The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) reported yesterday that the country’s balance of payments (BOP) posted a surplus of $255 million in March, a complete reversal of the $472-million deficit registered in the same month last year.

BSP Governor Amando M. Tetangco Jr. attributed the country’s healthy BOP position last month to strong remittances of overseas Filipino workers (OFW), robust portfolio investments, and recovering export earnings.

This brought the BOP surplus in the first quarter of the year to $1.363 billion or 20 percent lower than the $1.732-billion surplus registered in the same quarter last year.

“The BOP for March stood at a surplus of $255 million, bringing the cumulative surplus for the first quarter to $1.36 billion. Strong foreign exchange inflows from overseas Filipino remittances, portfolio investments, national government’s foreign borrowings, and merchandise exports supported the overall BOP position,” Tetangco added.

The amount of money sent home by OFWs went up by 7.7 percent to $2.785 billion in the first two months of the year or $263 million compared with $2.552 billion in the same period last year due to continued strong demand for professional and skilled Filipino workers combined with favorable global employment opportunities.

The BSP sees OFW remittances growing by six percent this year. Last year, remittances went up by 5.4 percent to a new record level of $17.348 billion from $16.426 billion in 2008 and exceeded the revised four percent growth forecast set by the central bank due to the steady growth of OFW remittances to the sustained demand for skilled Filipino workers overseas, particularly engineers, medical practitioners, and teachers.

On the other hand, foreign portfolio investments or “hot money” surged by 602 percent to $384.75 million from January to March this year or seven times the $54.78 million registered in the same period last year on the back of robust corporate earnings, a strong peso as well as the rise in US stocks and bouyant Asian markets.

The Philippines shrugged off the global recession and posted a portfolio investments net inflow of $388.02 million last year, a complete reversal of the $1.784 billion outflow posted in 2008.

Likewise, latest data released by the National Statistics Office (NSO) showed that the country’s merchandise exports jumped by 42.4 percent to $7.146 billion in the first two months of the year from $5.017 billion in the same period last year. –Lawrence Agcaoili (The Philippine Star)