Comunicat de presă


Balance of payments and external debt, April 2014

13.06.2014

In January - April 2014p, the balance-of-payments current account posted a deficit of EUR 298 million as compared with EUR 241 million in the same year-ago period, mainly amid the increase in income deficit (by EUR 878 million).

- EUR million -
  January - April 2013p January - April 2014p
CREDIT DEBIT NET CREDIT DEBIT NET
CURRENT ACCOUNT (A+B+C) 21,188 21,429 -241 23,565 23,863 -298
A. Goods and services 18,854 18,982 -128 20,573 20,378 195
a. Goods (exports fob – imports fob)* 15,670 16,633 -963 16,933 17,913 -980
b. Services 3,184 2,349 835 3,640 2,465 1,175
- transport 1,144 391 753 1,254 433 821
- tourism-travel 291 421 -130 360 451 -91
- other 1,749 1,537 212 2,026 1,581 445
B. Income 314 1,415 -1,101 300 2,279 -1,979
C. Current transfers 2,020 1,032 988 2,692 1,206 1,486

p provisional data
* Source: National Institute of Statistics (NIS) – International Trade of Goods. Imports FOB are calculated by the NBR based on the CIF/FOB conversion factor of 1.0430 set by the NIS.

Non-residents’ direct investment in Romania1 totalled EUR 785 million (up 8.7 percent as compared with January – April 2013), of which equity stakes (including reinvested earnings) amounted to EUR 705 million and intragroup loans to EUR 80 million.

Medium- and long-term external debt at end-April 2014 stood at EUR 76,182 million (80.6 percent of total external debt), down 0.9 percent from end-2013.

Short-term external debt at end-April 2014 totalled EUR 18,313 million (19.4 percent of total external debt), down 4.5 percent from end-2013.

1 Estimates.

Romania's external debt at end-April 2014*
and external debt service in January - April 2014
- EUR million -
  External debt External debt service
January - April 2014p
End-2013p End-April 2014p
I. Medium- and long-term external debt 76,894 76,182 6,337
I.1. Direct public debta) o/w: 28,347 29,371 1,849
I.1.1. IMF borrowings 1,121 850 281
I.2. Publicly guaranteed debtb) 1,229 1,184 43
I.3. Non-publicly guaranteed debt 36,157 35,703 2,522
I.4. Medium- and long-term deposits of non-residents 6,453 6,523 570e
I.5. IMF borrowingsc) 4,708 3,401 1,353
II. Short-term external debt 19,166 18,313 11,464e
Total external debt (I+II) 96,060 94,495 17,801

*) The balance of external debt is cash-based (excluding unmatured accrued interest); the IMF’s SDR allocations are not included.
a) external loans taken directly by the Ministry of Public Finance and local governments in compliance with the legislation on public debt, including Government Emergency Ordinance No. 99/2009 ratifying the Stand-By Arrangement between Romania and the IMF;
b) external loans guaranteed by the Ministry of Public Finance and local governments in compliance with the legislation on public debt;
c) loans under the Stand-By Arrangement concluded with the IMF, excluding the amount received by the Ministry of Public Finance from the IMF according to Government Emergency Ordinance No. 99/2009 (item I.1.1. in the table above).
e - estimates     p - provisional data

Medium- and long-term external debt service ratio ran at 30.8 percent in the first four months of 2014 against 41.9 percent in 2013. At end-April 2014, goods and services import cover stood at 7 months, the same level as at end-2013.

Methodological Notes

  1. According to the European and international statistical standards, starting with 2013, the National Bank of Romania, in co-operation with the National Institute of Statistics, has implemented a quarterly Survey on International Trade in Services, with the aim at directly collecting statistical data regarding international trade in services from resident reporting entities (institutions, enterprises, organisations, NGOs, associations etc.) that sell/buy international services to/from non-residents.
    The data resulted from the Survey are used to revise the quarterly balance of services included in the balance-of-payments current account, which is compiled quarterly on the basis of the data on the international transactions reported by the credit institutions on own behalf, as well as on behalf of their clients.
  2. External debt service ratio is calculated as a ratio of medium- and long-term external debt service to exports of goods and services.
  3. Import cover is calculated as a ratio of the international reserves (foreign exchange + gold) at end of period to average monthly imports of goods and services for the period under review.
  4. Balance of payments data are updated on a monthly basis; updates are available in the Interactive database.