Slovakia Shows Lowest Ever Public Finance Deficit of 0.78 Percent in 2017

Bratislava, October 22 (TASR) - Slovakia in 2017 posted its lowest annual public finance deficit ever, reaching a mere 0.78 percent of GDP, the Finance Ministry reported on Monday with reference to the Eurostat's autumn notification. According to the Finance Ministry, Slovakia's macroeconomic results are getting better and better year by year. "The deficit fell by 1.4 percentage points (p.p.) of GDP year-on-year {y-o-y) and it has decreased by 7 p.p. in total since 2009," stated the ministry. Compared to its spring notification, Eurostat revised Slovakia's public finance deficit for last year by 0.3 p.p. The ministry ascribes the better-than-projected deficit chiefly to higher-than-expected collection of taxes and levies. In particular, the developments were down to better collection of VAT and levies to mandatory social and health-insurance funds due to a positive situation on the labour market. Meanwhile, lower-than-planned drawing of EU funds in 2017 was behind lower-than-budgeted expenditures. "We're breaking all-time records in terms of performance of the country as a whole. Conclusions of the autumn notification confirm the deficit at 0.78 percent, which equals less than 0.8 percent of GDP. The deficit is thus 0.5 percent better than we originally planned," said Finance Minister Peter Kazimir (Smer-SD). Eurostat figures show gross government debt falling to 50.9 percent of GDP last year, posting a decrease for the fourth consecutive year. The figure is 1.8 p.p. better than projected. ko/mcs