Budget posts 17 billion Turkish Liras of deficit in November

The central government budget produced a deficit of 16.65 billion Turkish Liras ($483.4 million) in November, shrinking from the deficit of 186 billion liras in the previous month, the Finance Ministry has said.

In November 2023, the central government budget ran a surplus of 75.6 billion liras.

Expenditures rose by 42.5 percent year-on-year last month to 956 billion liras, while revenues increased by 25.8 percent annually to 939.5 billion liras.

Tax collection was up 22.6 percent to 819.5 billion liras, the ministry said in a statement.

Value-added tax revenues surged more than 100 percent from November last year to 104.4 billion liras and revenues from special consumption tax collection increased by 37 percent to 140.5 billion liras.

On the expenditure side, 809.8 billion liras were spent on non-interest expenditures, marking a 40.5 percent year-on-year.

Interest expenditures grew 54.6 percent to 146.3 billion liras last month.

Consequently, the central government budget ran a primary surplus of 129.6 billion liras against the primary surplus of 170.2 billion in November last year. The budget ran a primary deficit of 50 billion liras in October.

In the first 11 months of 2024, the overall budget deficit widened 140 percent annually to 1.3 trillion liras.

Expenditures surged 75 percent year-on-year to 9.1 trillion liras, while revenues increased more than 67 percent to 7.79 trillion liras.

The primary deficit was 81.7 billion liras in January-November, against a primary surplus of 99.9 billion liras in the same period of last year.