PRAGUE, Jan 15 (Reuters) - The Czech current account swung
to a 1.61 billion crown ($89.34 million) deficit in November
after recording a 12.4 billion crown surplus in October, and was
close to a market consensus of 1.5 billion crowns.
The swing looked chiefly due to dividend outflows paid by
international companies but was also affected by a surplus on
the balance of trade in goods and services. November foreign
trade showed a 14.5 billion surplus, higher than forecast.
The balance of services showed a 3.45 billion crown surplus
and the balance of goods posted a surplus of 17 billion.
The income balance -- which includes dividend payments and
other profits booked by foreign companies -- showed a 18.79
billion crown deficit, smaller than the last year's 22.06
billion gap and bigger than the 9.92 billion shortfall in
October.
It reflected a dividend payment of 9.2 billion crowns from
Czech subsidiaries to their foreign parent firms and estimated
reinvested earnings of 7.8 billion crowns, the central bank
said.
The 12-month rolling deficit dipped to 33.33 billion crowns
($1.85 billion), or 0.9 percent of estimated 2009 nominal gross
domestic product (GDP), according to Reuters calculations.
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KEY POINTS:
(CZK billions) Nov Oct Nov forecast
Current Account -1.61 12.41 -1.5
Financial Account 16.04 -5.94 n/a
Net Direct Investment 3.64 6.11 n/a
(For full table, double click on [])
- The balance of current transfers includes a deficit of 1
billion crowns on transfers from the Czech Republic to the EU
budget.
- The capital account includes drawing of 2 billion crowns from
the EU budget and a 4.6 billion crown revenue from the sale of
emission permits.
- The annual current account deficit total has been falling.
- Capital inflow on the financial account was around 16 billion
crowns under ECB methodology.
- The net inflow of direct investment stood at 3.6 billion
crowns and was affected by the expected reinvested earnings.
- The inflow of portfolio investment was due primarily to a
foreign bond issue by the government and a state-owned entity.
- The total volume of bond issues abroad exceeded 10 billion
crown.
- The sale of part of crown-denominated debt securities from
foreign entities' portfolios corrected inflow of capital.
- The annual net direct investment inflow total has been
declining.
- The annual net portfolio investment total has been showing an
increasing inflow of funds.
- Other investment showed a surplus of 16.3 billion crown, due
to a change in the short-term international position of banks (a
decline in short-term assets and a rise in short-term
liabilities).
- The government drew loans from the European Investment Bank
for the development of transport infrastructure in the amount of
2.2 billion crowns.
- The balance of transaction in the central bank' s
international reserves adjusted for valuation changes rose by
6.2 billion crowns.
BACKGROUND:
- Analyst expectations before data release []
- Czech Nov foreign trade figures []
- Polish Oct C/A data []
- Slovak Oct C/A data []
- Hungary's Q3 C/A gap []
- Report on last Czech c.bank rate decision.......[]
[] [] [] []
LINKS:
- For further details on November of payments numbers and past
data, Reuters 3000 Xtra users can click on the Czech National
Bank's website:
http://www.cnb.cz/en/statistics/bop_stat/
- For LIVE Czech economic data releases, click on <ECONCZ>
- Instant Views on other Czech data []
- Overview of Czech macroeconomic indicators []
- Key data releases in central Europe []
- For Czech money markets data click on <CZKVIEW>
- Czech money guide <CZK/1>
- Czech benchmark state bond prices <0#CZBMK=>
- Czech forward money market rates <CZKFRA>
(Reporting by Jana Mlcochova; editing by Patrick Graham)
