BELGRADE (Serbia), December 12 (SeeNews) – Serbia's central bank, the NBS, expects the country's current account deficit to stand at 5.2% of gross domestic product (GDP) at the end of 2018, a central bank official said on Wednesday.
"In the last six years, the current account deficit was halved from 11% in 2012," the deputy director of the research and statistics division of the NBS, Milan Trajkovic, said in a video file posted on the website of news agency Tanjug.
The current account deficit in 2018 will be covered by the foreign direct investment (FDI) into the country and is the result of the increase in imports and the investment cycle since 2015, Trajkovic said.
The cumulative economic growth since 2015 stands at about 12%, while investments rose by about 30% in the period, which causes an increase in the import of equipment and raw materials, he added.
Serbia's current account deficit rose to 1.303 billion euro ($1.477 billion) in the first eight months of 2018, from 1.218 billion euro in the like period of last year, according to data by the central bank.
In 2017, Serbia's current account deficit widened to 2.09 billion euro from 1.075 billion euro in the previous year.
($ = 0.8824 euro)