Romanian govt lowers 2022 deficit target to 5.74%/GDP in budget revision

In nominal terms, the budget gap remained unchanged at 80.1 billion lei ($16.82 billion/16.21 billion euro), the government said in a press release on Thursday.

Expected revenues of the general consolidated government budget increased by 521.1 million lei, while expenses grew by 522.1 million lei compared to the last budget adjustment.

The GDP is expected to grow 4.6% on the year to 1.396 trillion lei in 2022, edging up from the previous August estimate of 1.373 trillion lei.

The finance, labour and agriculture ministries received extra funds following the budget revision, while European funds, health and transport ministries are among those facing the largest budget cuts, the budget revision document posted on the finance ministry's website showed.

Meeting the new budget deficit target of 5.74% of GDP is achievable, considering lower investment expenses during the first nine months of 2022, the Fiscal Council of Romania stated in an opinion published on Thursday.

Romania ended the first nine months of the year with a budget deficit of 41.7 billion lei, decreasing from 44.29 billion lei recorded in the same period of last year. As a percentage of GDP, the January-September budget deficit decreased by 71 basis points to 3.04%.

In 2021, Romania’s consolidated budget was in a deficit of 6.72% of GDP.

(1 euro=4.9418 lei)