Political turmoil may have been the norm in May, but the Serbian government apparently has kept its eye on the ball with regard to the economy, as unlike many countries in the region, Serbia saw its state budget deficit come in lower than expected over the first four months of the year.
To be sure, the budget continue to runneth over, but the deficit came in at RSD 34 bln, as opposed to a whopping RSD 89 bln that was predicted.
Total government debt is now EUR 34.9 bln or slightly more than 50 percent of GDP.
The slowdown in running up a deficit, however, is good news as regional growth is not optimistic. IMF predictions have now slated regional GDP growth to come in at 3.5 percent less than previously expected. This combined with high inflation will likely make for a difficult second half of the year.
Photo by Marek Slusarczyk, CC BY 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons.
