Remittances up 3.1% end-Oct

by Lee C. Chipongian

Overseas Filipinos sent home $26.74 billion of cash remittances in the first 10 months of the year, up by 3.1 percent from same period last year of $25.93 billion, according to the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas on Thursday, Dec. 15.

Cash remittances are funds transferred via the formal banking system and it is data easily captured by the BSP. The other remittances data is personal remittances which the central bank defines as the sum of the net compensation of overseas Filipinos, as well as personal transfers and capital transfers between households. 

For the month of October, cash remittances totalled $2.91 billion, which was 3.5 percent higher than same period last year of $2.81 billion.

“The expansion in cash remittances in October 2022 was due to the growth in receipts from land-based and sea-based workers,” said the BSP.

Land-based workers’ remittances rose by 3.6 percent year-on-year to $2.33 billion compared to $2.25 billion same time in 2022. Sea-based workers’ fund transfers amounted to $580 million from $560 million or up by 3.6 percent. 

Bulk of remittances came from the US with 41.7 percent of the total. Singapore accounted for seven percent, Saudi Arabia with 5.9 percent and Japan with five percent of the total.

The US will naturally be reported as a big source of remittances because of the common practice of remittance centers using correspondent banks located in the US. “Remittances coursed through money couriers cannot be disaggregated by actual country source and are lodged under the country where the main offices are located, which, in many cases, is in the US,” said the BSP.

As of end-October, the BSP said personal remittances increased by 3.1 percent to $29.72 billion from $28.82 billion last year.

For the month of October alone, personal remittances went up by 3.5 percent to $3.23 billion from $3.12 billion same month in 2021.

Land-based workers with work contracts of one year or more remitted $2.53 billion, up by 3.5 percent from $2.44 billion last year. Sea- and land-based workers with work contracts of less than one year, meantime, transferred $640 million which was higher by 3.6 percent from $620 million last year.

By end-2022, the BSP expects cash remittances to grow by four percent year-on-year, unchanged from previous years’ projections, including pre-pandemic. 

In 2021, cash remittances went up by 5.1 percent year-on-year to a record high of $31.42 billion.