Turkey's current account balance sees $1.8B gap in July

ANKARA

Turkey's current account balance registered a deficit of $1.8 billion in July, the Turkish Central Bank said on Friday.

The figure deteriorated from $1.9 billion surplus in July 2019 and down from $2.9 billion this June, the bank said.

Bringing 12-month rolling deficit to $14.9 billion as of this July, current account deficit mainly stemmed from outflow in services.

Net inflow in services item decreased to $288 million in July, down by $4.6 billion in the same period last year, the bank said.

"On the other hand, the good deficit recorded net outflow of $1.8 billion decreasing by $425 million," it noted.

An Anadolu Agency survey on Thursday showed that economists had forecast a deficit of $1.9 billion.

Projections of a group of 24 economists ranged from $800 million to $2.8 billion for the month.

The survey also showed the end-2020 current account balance is expected to show a deficit of $23.6 billion.

The country's new economic program, unveiled last September, forecast a current-account-surplus-to-GDP ratio of minus 1.2% for 2020.

Bank data showed that gold and energy excluded current account posted $2.1billion surplus, compared to $5.3 billion surplus in July 2019.