Page 52 - RusRPTMay19

6.0 Public Sector 6.1 Budget
After climbing by nearly 30% last year in nominal terms, budget revenues rose another 13% y/y in the first quarter of this year.
Revenues from oil & gas taxes increased by 7% after rising by about 50% last year. Other budget revenues increased at about the earlier rate of over 15%. A similar pace of growth was seen in VAT revenues. The impact on budget revenues from the VAT increases of January 1, 2019 is still ahead as VAT is paid with a quarter’s delay.
Growth in federal budget spending accelerated from last year to over 8%, which is the pace budgeted for this year. Defence spending increased by 13% y/y in the first quarter. The budget surplus for the last twelve months still corresponded to 2.8% of GDP.
Russia’s budget revenues expanded another 13.2% y/y in March to RUB1.8 trillion. As in the previous two months, non-oil revenues registered the most significant growth (up 2% y/y), driven by the VAT hike, while oil and gas revenues rose 9.8%. In 1Q19, budget revenues reached RUB4.6 trillion, up 12.6% y/y. Spending rose 10.9% y/y in March and 8.4% y/y in 1Q19 to $4 trillion.
Russia posted RUB545.7bn or 2.2% of GDP surplus of the federal budget in the first quarter of 2019, the Finance Ministry said on April 13. The budget shower RUB4.59 trillion in revenues (23% of annual target) and RUB4.04 trillion of expenditures (22.4% of annual target).
In March alone the federal budget posted RUB166.9bn surplus, making a 1.8% of GDP and recovering from the surprising deficit of RUB57bn seen in February. The ministry also revised the data for February, which now showed a slight 0.2% surplus.
This year the ministry plans to record a RUB1.9 trillion surplus of 1.8% of GDP. In 2018 the federal budget recorded the first surplus since 2011, posting a record surplus of 2.7% of GDP.
52 RUSSIA Country Report May 2019 www.intellinews.com