Category Archive: Monthly public finances release

Borrowing fell by just £33 million in April compared with last year, despite a £0.8 billion special dividend received on RBS shares. After the sharp drop in borrowing in 2018-19, we expect a small rise this year due to tax and spending giveaways. The 2018-19 outturn was revised down by £1.1 billion this month and…

Today provides the first provisional outturn estimate for the budget deficit for the full 2018-19 financial year: £24.7 billion, the lowest since 2001-02. Borrowing was £17.2 billion lower than in 2017-18, but £1.8 billion above our March forecast. However, in recent years the initial outturn estimate of the deficit has on average been revised down…

Broad-based growth in tax receipts and lower debt interest spending continued to push the deficit down relative to last year in February. With only one month of 2018-19 to go, borrowing is down almost half relative to the same period in 2017-18 – broadly in line with our recent forecast.

Double-digit growth in tax receipts in January generated a record monthly budget surplus, up sharply relative to last year. Over the first ten months of 2018-19, borrowing is now down almost half relative to the same period in 2017-18 – a slightly larger fall than implied by our latest full-year forecast.

Higher spending pushed borrowing up slightly in December, relative to last year. But over the first nine months of 2018-19, borrowing is still down by more than a quarter relative to the same period in 2017-18.

Continued strength in receipts growth means borrowing over the first eight months of 2018-19 is down almost 30 per cent relative to the same period in 2017-18.

Higher spending growth in October pushed the deficit up relative to last October. But strong receipts growth means borrowing in the first seven months of 2018-19 is still down almost 30 per cent relative to the same period in 2017-18.

Strong tax receipts and lower debt interest payments are sustaining a sharp fall in the budget deficit relative to last year. Extrapolating performance over the year to date would see the full-year deficit come in £11 billion lower than forecast in March, however the recent strength of cash corporation tax receipts is not yet being…

Despite rising in August, borrowing in the first five months of 2018-19 was almost a third lower than in the same period last year. On a like-for-like basis receipts growth has so far outpaced our full-year March forecast, while debt interest spending is already down £2.2 billion on last year.