Guyana’s Central Bank disclosed on Monday that 65% of the US$607 million that was approved by the National Assembly to support the 2022 budget was transferred to the Consolidated Fund. The remainder – some US$207 million – is expected to be withdrawn in the final quarter.
The first withdrawal of US$200 million occurred in the second quarter. This amount represents 32.91% of the budgeted GY$126.69 billion (US$607.65 million). For the third quarter of 2022, Central Bank said the second tranche, GY$41.7 billion (US$200 million), was withdrawn – another 32.91%.
Hence, a total of GY$83.4 billion (US$400 million) has been transferred from the Fund, thereby amounting to 65.83% of the budgeted outflows for the year.
As regards the market value of the Fund at September 30, 2022, Central Bank said this stood at GY$219.17 billion (US$1.05 billion), an increase of 39.56% (GY$62.12 billion/US$297.96 million) from the previous quarter.
Furthermore, the operational manager said the Fund recorded a profit of GY$995.75 million (US$4.78 million) in the third quarter solely due to interest earned on deposits. This resulted in a return of 0.513% for the quarter compared with 0.177% in the previous quarter. The Fund also earned an annualised return of 0.275% since its inception.
During this quarter as well, Guyana received revenue for four lifts of 1-million-barrel (approximate) oil cargoes as its share of profit oil, taking the number received for 2022 to seven.
It is expected that revenue from an additional six oil cargoes will be obtained this year resulting in an annual total of thirteen.
As of September 30, 2022, Guyana received revenue for sixteen one-million-barrel lifts since the inception of the Fund.
Based on the formula used to calculate the ceiling on annual withdrawals from the Fund, almost US$1 billion could be available for support to the country’s 2023 budget.
