Cash budget deficit shrinks in July, shows ministry data

ANKARA

The Treasury has said that its cash budget posted a deficit of 137 billion Turkish Liras in July, an improvement from the previous month.

That compares with the 431 billion deficit the cash budget produced in June.

Cash revenues rose from 555 billion liras in June to 791 billion liras last month, data from the Treasury and Finance Ministry showed.

Expenditures declined slightly from 986 billion liras to 928 billion liras.

Interest expenditures fell from 96.4 billion liras in June to 88.9 billion liras in July. In the first seven months of 2024, a total of 618.5 billion liras went to interest expenditures.

Non-interest expenditures, on the other hand, declined from 889 billion liras to 839 billion liras, with total non-interest expenditures totaling 5.2 trillion liras in the January-July period.

Consequently, the cash budget posted a primary deficit of 47.6 billion last month, down from a deficit of 334.5 billion liras.

In the first seven months of 2024, the primary deficit amounted to 522.9 billion liras.

Authorities recently revised the forecast for the 2024 budget, including deficit and tax revenues.

In the Central Government Budget Realizations and Expectations report, the budget deficit expectation was revised downward from 2.65 trillion Turkish Liras to 2 trillion liras.

The report also projects lower expenditures, while raising the tax revenue forecast from an initial 7.4 trillion liras to 7.54 trillion liras.

In the 2024 budget, the government initially projected that expenditures would total more than 11 trillion liras. However, according to the revised figures, expenditures are expected to be 10.96 trillion liras at the end of this year.