“For the 14th consecutive year, the current account recorded a surplus. The $601 million surplus in 2016 (representing 0.2 percent of GDP), however, was 91.7 percent lower than the $7.3 billion (2.5 percent of GDP) surplus in 2015. Any economist would explain the current account shortfall by noting that it follows the cyclical trend of the economy since the trade balance is actually the biggest factor in determining the current account balance. Obviously, exports weren’t able to catch up and were almost stagnant at $43.4 billion, from $43.2 billion, up by 0.6 percent. A separate BSP report showed that remittances from overseas Filipinos totaled $29.706 billion, up 4.9 percent from $28.308 billion.

Source: Manila Times March 19, 2017 17:37 UTC