OFW remittances surge in Sept – BSP
Credit to Author: Jordeene B. Lagare| Date: Fri, 15 Nov 2019 16:22:44 +0000
MONEY sent home by overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) climbed in September, data from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) showed on Friday.
In a statement, the central bank said personal remittances — made up of OFWs’ net compensation; personal transfers, whether in cash or kind; and capital transfers between households — reached $24.6 billion in the first nine months of 2019, 3.9 percent higher than the $23.7 billion in the same period a year ago.
In September alone, remittances rose by 6.3 percent to $2.6 billion from $2.5 billion in 2018.
The Bangko Sentral credited the increase to the “steady remittance inflows from land-based OF workers with work contracts of one year or more, which grew to $18.8 billion from $18.2 billion in the same period last year.”
“Remittance inflows from sea-based workers and land-based workers with short-term contracts also contributed higher at $5.3 billion this year, compared to $4.9 billion a year ago,” it added.
Cash remittances, which only count money coursed through banks by OFWs with work contracts of less than one year, also rose to $2.4 billion in September from $2.2 billion.
This drove cash remittances to hit $22.2 billion in the January-to-September period from $21.3 billion.
Cash remittances from land-based workers increased by 3.2 percent to $17.3 billion and those from sea-based grew by 8 percent to $4.9 billion.
By country of origin, the United States contributed the highest number of remittances in the first three quarters at 37.5 percent. It was followed by Saudi Arabia, Singapore, the United Arab Emirates, Japan, the United Kingdom, Canada, Hong Kong, Germany and Kuwait.
“The combined remittances from these countries accounted for 78.3 percent of total cash remittances during the period,” the BSP said.