ArmInfo. The importance of private transfers in terms of financing and developing the economy of Armenia has dramatically decreased in recent years. On December 18 at a press conference, member of the Board of the Central Bank of Armenia Artur Stepanyan stated this.
In this regard, he explained that over the years, remittances accounted for 25-26% of GDP, with a subsequent decrease to 18-20% of GDP. And this year, he said, this figure was only 10%.
"But this does not mean a decrease in the volume of transfers, but only a decrease in their share in GDP," A. Stepanyan noted, stressing that by the end of 2018 the net inflow of transfers will increase by 10%.
In particular, he said that in the inflow the average size of a single remittance is $ 500, whereas in the outflow this figure is $ 2,800, which, he said, is largely due to the growth in online retailing of individuals, whose main markets are China, the UAE and others.
Regarding the possible taxation of transfers, a member of the Central Bank Board expressed the opinion that the issue of this should be closed, since this is only about $ 500.
To note, in November of this year the Central Bank of Armenia has once again revised the forecast for the growth of remittances of individuals for 2018 in the direction of slowing down - up to 1-3% from the previously forecasted 5-7%. The updated narrowed range of forecast for the growth of private transfers of the Central Bank led to lower than expected increase in volume in the third quarter due to a new round of devaluation of the ruble against the background of new US sanctions against Russia. The probability that the ruble devaluation trend will continue in the fourth quarter of the Central Bank does not exclude, on which the prediction of a slowdown in the growth of private transfers is based.
According to the Central Bank, in the third quarter of 2018, the growth in the inflow of individuals' transfers slowed down from 19.8% to 14.5%, while the volume of remittances from Russia reduced the growth rates from 28.6% to 19%. In January-September 2018, compared with the same period of 2017, the growth in private transfers grew 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 in the 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, Russia's share for the first 9 months of 2018 decreased slightly - to 60.2% from 60.3% a year earlier.
According to Central Bank statistics, in 2017, the inflow of natural persons' transfers to Armenia increased by 14.6% (against the projected 14-16%) to $ 1.757 billion. In this case, the outflow of transfers grew by 25.6% to $ 1.026 billion in 2017. As a result, net the inflow of transfers in 2017 increased by 2.1%, to $ 731 million. In the tributary, Russia's share is 60.6% or $ 1.065 billion, while in the outflow - 34.5% or $ 354 million. The inflow of transfers from Russia grew in 2017 at 18, 7% with an outflow growth of 6.1%, which increased net inflow from Russia by 26.2%.