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Kuwait Income Hits $70 Billion in 11 Months | ASHARQ AL-AWSAT English Archive 2005 -2017
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KUWAIT CITY (AFP) – OPEC member Kuwait posted 20.2 billion dinars (69.6 billion dollars) in revenues during the first 11 months of the fiscal year ending on March 31, finance ministry figures showed on Wednesday.

That marked an increase of 59.4 percent over the budget estimates of 43.7 billion dollars for the whole fiscal year.

Actual spending was 44.3 billion dollars, just 67.7 percent of the projected expenditure of 65.4 billion dollars for the whole year.

That leaves a preliminary budget surplus of 25.3 billion dollars, which is likely to shrink when the finance ministry makes end-year accounting.

Oil revenues came in at 65.7 billion dollars, up 63.6 percent on estimates of 40.2 billion dollars for the whole year and constituting more than 94 percent of total income.

Income began declining in October when the price of oil fell sharply from record 147 dollars a barrel in July.

But the results still put OPEC’s fourth largest producer well on track to post a budget surplus for the 10th straight year.

Kuwait plans to cut spending in 2009-2010 by a massive 36 percent and is projecting a huge deficit of 14.6 billion dollars.

Based on official figures compiled by AFP, Kuwait has chalked up a total budget surplus of 113 billion dollars over the past nine fiscal years, starting with 1999-2000.