Hungary’s cash flow-based budget deficit reached 816.8 billion HUf (2.69bn EUR) by the end of July, the ministry for National Economy has revealed.
The deficit excludes local councils and reached 70 percent of the full-year target, the ministry added.
In July, the budget ran a 94.4 billion HUF surplus compared to a monthly deficit of 62.7 billion HUF a year earlier.
According to MTI, the figures were unchanged from the preliminary data released earlier in August.
The ministry said the state of government finances is “stable” and the deficit target of 2.4 percent of GDP, calculated according to EU accounting rules, “can be safely achieved”.
Reports state the ministry outlined that the deficit had been lifted by advance pay-outs of European Union funding from national coffers, adding that such pay-outs reached 1,090 billion HUF in the first seven months this year as against 601.7 billion HUF a year earlier.
On the revenue side, the balance was lifted by personal income and payroll tax as well as by the 146.7 billion HUF revenue arriving from last year’s state-owned land sales.
Funding from the European Union entering the central budget chapters related to the current EU budgetary period rose by 28.4 percent to 194.2 billion HUF but was just 12.6 percent of the more-than-doubled full-year target.
The ministry said the delay will be made up for in the second half. EU monies coming in as retroactive pay-out of EU support were 44.5 billion HUF, or 51.3 percent, of the annual plan after hardly any such pay-out one year earlier.