Public administration sector’s financial assets up 1.3 pct in Q3 2024

The public administration sector’s financial assets, expressed as a share of GDP, increased in Q3 2024 by 1.3 percentage points compared to the year-ago period, to 27.9%, shows data released on Wednesday by the National Bank of Romania (BNR).

According to the cited source, this upward trend was mainly the effect of the 19.3% increase in cash and deposits, which hit 8.4% of GDP, against the backdrop of the collection of amounts resulting from the euro-denominated debt securities issued by the Finance Ministry.

Loans granted by public administrations accounted for 2.2% of GDP (up 0.1% from Q3 2023). Other accounts receivable (taxes, social contributions, trade receivables, amounts owed by companies to public authorities and external receivables) advanced 0.9 percentage points to 7.3% of GDP.

Equity participations and shares/investment fund units increased 6.0% compared to Q3 2023, but in relative terms they dropped 0.4% to 9.9% of GDP.

Financial commitments of public administrations, expressed as a share of GDP, increased by 7.1% to 61.3% at the end of Q3 2024, mainly due to the increase in the stock of debt securities (+7.0% in the reporting period, to 43.1% of GDP), as a result of bond issues launched by the Finance Ministry on the domestic and foreign market in order to finance the budget deficit and refinance the government debt. A similar trend was recorded in the stock of other accounts payable, which advanced 0.2% year-over-year to 10.0% of GDP, as an effect of the registration of non-reimbursable external funds.

Committed government loans increased 7.0% compared to Q3 2023, due to the issuance of non-negotiable retail government securities under the Tezaur program, but in relative terms they dipped 0.2% to 7.2% of GDP.

The public administration sector’s net financing requirement was 1.9% of GDP in Q3 2024 and 1.4% of GDP in Q3 2023, with the financing requirement of the central administration standing at 1.8% of GDP (compared to 1.0% of GDP in Q3 2023). The local administrations’ net financial requirement stood at 0.1% of GDP in both reporting quarters. The net financing requirement of social security administrations in Q3 2024 was 0.01%, compared to 0.2% of GDP in Q3 2023.