Angelo Taningco
Economist, Treasury Group

Overseas Filipinos (OFs) personal remittances fell 5.2% year-on-year (yoy) to $2.3 billion in April, a reversal from its 11.8% yoy growth in March, according to the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) remittance data released on 15 June. This led the cumulative OFs remittances over the January-April period to reach $10.0 billion, which is 4.7% higher from a year ago.

Figure: OFs Personal Remittances
Jan. 2015 – Apr. 2017
(PHP billion)

 
OFs cash remittances, which account for 90% of personal remittances, amounted to $2.1 billion in April and $9.0 billion in January-April with the former lower by 5.9% yoy and the latter higher by 4.2% from a year ago. Its April yoy decline was largely brought about by lower OFs cash remittances coming from Australia, Canada, Singapore, Saudi Arabia, and United Kingdom. Furthermore, we surmise that both steady inflation and peso appreciation in April may have induced several OFs to temper their cash remittances into the country, thereby contributing to the monthly drop. Despite the cumulative remittance growth slowdown, we think it will rebound in the upcoming months, and thus, we maintain our full-year OFs cash remittance growth forecast at 6.5%, which would translate to $28.6 billion for the year.

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