ArmInfo.The Central Bank of Armenia has once again revised its forecast for the growth of remittances of individuals for 2018.
The regulator revised the forecast towards growth slackening- from the previous 5-7% to the current 1-3%. This is stated in the program of monetary policy of the Central Bank for the Q4 of 2018, published on November 27.
The updated forecast for the growth of private transfers the Central Bank explained by lower than expected increase in volume in the Q3 due to a new round of devaluation of the ruble against the background of new US sanctions against Russia. The Central Bank does not exclude the probability of maintenance of the tendency of ruble devaluation Q4 as well, on which the prediction of a slowdown in the growth of private transfers is based.
Thus, according to the Central Bank, in the third quarter of 2018, the growth in the flow of transfers from individuals slowed down from 19.8% to 14.5%, and the volume of remittances from Russia reduced the growth rates from 28.6% to 19%. In January-September 2018, compared with the same period in 2017, the growth in private transfers declined sharply from 16.4% to 3.6%, reaching $ 1.279 billion, which was accompanied by a similar trend of ascending inflows from Russia from 16.5% to the current 3.4%, amounting to $ 769.8 million. Against this background, in January-September 2018, the y-o-y growth of outflow of transfers from individuals accelerated from last year's 18.9% to the current 23.5%, following the acceleration of the outflow of remittances from Armenia to Russia - from 10.3% to 22.5%. As a result, according to the Central Bank, in the structure of the inflow, the share of Russia for 9 months of 2018 decreased slightly - to 60.2% from 60.3% a year earlier. But in quarterly terms, there was a moderate increase in Russia's share in the inflow of transfers: from 56.3% in the first quarter to 60.4% in the second quarter and reaching 62.8% in the third quarter, against a more significant advance a year earlier - from 52.8 % in the first quarter to 59.1% in the second quarter and 65.9% in the third quarter. According to statistics from the Central Bank, in 2017 the inflow of individuals' transfers to Armenia increased by 14.6% (against the forecast of 14-16%), reaching $ 1.757 billion. At the same time, the outflow of transfers increased by 25.6% in 2017 to $ 1.026 billion. As a result the net the inflow of transfers in 2017 increased by 2.1%, reaching $ 731 million. In the inflow, Russia's share was 60.6% or $ 1.065 billion, and in the outflow - 34.5% or $ 354 million. The inflow of transfers from Russia grew in 2017 by 18, 7%, with outflow growth of 6.1%, which increased net inflow from Russia by 26.2%.