Kuwait: Opec member Kuwait posted a budget surplus of 5.28 billion dinars (Dh71 billion) in the 2010-11 fiscal year, down 38 per cent from the preliminary figure, finance ministry data showed Thursday.
Revenues reached 21.5 billion dinars, with oil revenues contributing 19.9 billion dinars, while spending amounted to 16.2 billion dinars in the fiscal year which ended in March, the data showed.
In May, the country posted a preliminary budget surplus of 8.5 billion dinars, or 23.1 per cent of Kuwait's gross domestic product, above market expectations and the 6.4 billion seen in the previous fiscal year.
Kuwait transfers ten per cent of its revenues to a future generations fund, managed by the country's sovereign wealth fund. The net surplus for 2010-11 after the transfer is 3.13 billion dinars, the final data showed.
Kuwait had set its 2010-11 budget with a deficit of 6.6 billion dinars, assuming that crude, its main revenue earner, would fetch $43 per barrel. US benchmark crude prices floated between $65 and $115 per barrel last year. Kuwait posted an 8.18 billion dinars surplus in its 2009-10 budget.
In June, Kuwait's parliament approved a budget of 19.4 billion dinars for the 2011-12 fiscal year, the biggest since at least 2003 and a 19 per cent jump from the previous year, basing it on an oil price of $60 per barrel. Analysts polled by Reuters in June forecast that given the higher oil prices, Kuwait will post a fiscal surplus of 20.2 per cent of GDP in 2011-12, the highest in the Gulf. Concerned about regional unrest, Gulf oil exporters have boosted government spending to ease social tensions.
