Comunicat de presă


Balance of Payments in January-April 2008

16.06.2008

In January-April 2008, the balance-of-payments current account posted a deficit of EUR 4,842 million. Behind this development stood chiefly the wider trade deficit, which ran at EUR 5,544 million.

                                                                                                                                      - EUR million -
  January - April 2007* January - April 2008**
CREDIT DEBIT NET CREDIT DEBIT NET
CURRENT ACCOUNT (A+B+C)   14,583   19,087   -4,504   17,659   22,501  -4,842
A. Goods and services   11,646   16,230   -4,584   14,078  19,314  -5,236
a. Goods (exports fob - imports fob)***    9,208   14,069   -4,861   10,747  16,291  -5,544
b. Services    2,438     2,161      277    3,331   3,023     308
- transport       628       712      -84      928      845       83
- tourism - travel       286       300      -14      358      378      -20
- other     1,524    1,149     375    2,045   1,800      245
B. Incomes       818    2,189  -1,371      705   2,174  -1,469
C. Current transfers    2,119       668   1,451    2,876   1,013   1,863
* revised data
** provisional data
*** Source: National Institute of Statistics; imports fob are calculated based on CIF/FOB conversion coefficient of 1.0834 set by NIS.

Roughly 66.5 percent of the current account deficit were covered by inflows from foreign direct investment worth EUR 3,218 million in January-April 2008. Equity stakes and reinvested earnings accounted for 70 percent of the total figure, with intra-group loans1 covering the remaining 30 percent.

Medium- and long-term external debt2 at end-April 2008 added 8.4 percent against end-2007 to EUR 41,754 million.

Public and publicly guaranteed external debt at the end of April 2008 came in at EUR 10,421 million, accounting for 25 percent of medium- and long-term debt, compared with 27 percent at end-2007.

Non-publicly guaranteed external debt amounted to EUR 26,741 million at end-April 2008, standing 7.5 percent higher than at end-December 2007.

Romania's medium- and long-term external debt at end-April 2008* and external debt service in January-April 2008

                                                                                                                                                                 - EUR million -
  Medium- and long-term external debt External debt service in January-April 2008p
Balance at end-April 2007r Balance at end-April 2008p
1. DIRECT PUBLIC DEBTa) 7,299 7,495 166
2. PUBLICLY GUARANTEED DEBTb),
of which:
3,097 2,926 140
- public sectorc) 2,961 2,794 138
- private sectord) 136 132 2
3. Non-publicly guaranteed debt 24,885 26,741 1,781
4. External debt (1+2+3) 35,281 37,162 2,087
5. Medium- and long-term deposits of non-residents 3,219 4,592 156e
Total external debt (4+5) 38,500 41,754 2,243

*) The balance of medium- and long-term external debt is cash-based (not including unmatured accrued interest).
a) external loans taken directly by the Ministry of Economy and Finance/local general government in compliance with the legislation on public debt
b) external loans guaranteed by the Ministry of Economy and Finance/local general government in compliance with the legislation on public debt
c) financial and non-financial corporations with majority state-owned capital
d) financial and non-financial corporations with majority private capital
r - revised data
p - provisional data
e - estimates

In January-April 2008, import cover4 stood at 5.6 months as against 6 months of prospective imports of goods and services at year-end 2007.


Notes:

  1. Loans between the foreign investor and the resident firm.
  2. External debt balance is subject to monthly revision.
  3. External debt service ratio is computed as a ratio of medium- and long-term external debt service to exports of goods and services.
  4. Import cover is computed as a ratio of the NBR's official reserves (foreign exchange + gold) at