Comunicat de presă


Balance of payments and external debt, November 2013

17.01.2014

In January - November 2013p, the balance-of-payments current account posted a deficit of EUR 1,326 million as compared with EUR 5,388 million in the same year-earlier period, due to the decrease in trade deficit (by EUR 3,569 million), as well as the increase in services surplus (by EUR 1,499 million1) and current transfers surplus (by EUR 292 million).

- EUR million -
  January - November 2012s January - November 2013p
CREDIT DEBIT NET CREDIT DEBIT NET
CURRENT ACCOUNT (A+B+C) 56,004 61,392 -5,388 62,189 63,515 -1,326
A. Goods and services 49,502 55,223 -5,721 55,269 55,922 -653
a. Goods (exports fob – imports fob)* 41,921 48,589 -6,668 45,705 48,804 -3,099
b. Services 7,581 6,634 947 9,564 7,118 2,446
- transport 2,268 1,219 1,049 3,346 1,356 1,990
- tourism-travel 1,044 1,312 -268 1,153 1,397 -244
- other 4,269 4,103 166 5,065 4,365 700
B. Incomes 1,275 4,045 -2,770 1,207 5,134 -3,927
C. Current transfers 5,227 2,124 3,103 5,713 2,459 3,254

p provisional data, ssemifinal data
1 Data for 2013 H1 have been compiled to incorporate the results of the quarterly Surveys on International Trade in Services (see Methodological Notes).
* 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 Romania2 totalled EUR 2,388 million (up 22.3 percent as compared with January - November 20123), of which equity stakes consolidated with the estimated net loss amounted to EUR 1,347 million and intragroup loans to EUR 1,041 million.

Medium- and long-term external debt at end-November 2013 stood at EUR 77,958 million (80.1 percent of total external debt), 1.0 percent below the level recorded at end-2012.

Short-term external debt at end-November 2013 totalled EUR 19,336 million (19.9 percent of total external debt), down 7.6 percent from end-2012.

2 Estimates
3 Revised data according to the results of the Survey on Foreign Direct Investment in 2012.

Romania's external debt at end-November 2013*
and external debt service in January - November 2013
- EUR million -
  External debt External debt service
January - November 2013p
End-2012p End-November 2013p
I. Medium- and long-term external debt 78,760 77,958 22,759
I.1. Direct public debta) o/w: 23,755 28,678 5,569
I.1.1. IMF borrowings 2,144 1,251 891
I.2. Publicly guaranteed debtb) 1,424 1,260 167
I.3. Non-publicly guaranteed debt 37,182 36,532 10,481
I.4. Medium- and long-term deposits of non-residents 7,745 6,511 2,891e
I.5. IMF borrowingsc) 8,654 4,977 3,651
II. Short-term external debt 20,921 19,336 28,699e
Total external debt (I+II) 99,681 97,294 51,458

*) 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 above table).
e - estimates     p - provisional data

Medium- and long-term external debt service ratio ran at 41.2 percent in January - November 2013, against 34.9 percent in 2012. At end-November 2013, goods and services import cover stood at 7 months, as compared with 7.1 months at end-2012

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.