Remittances from overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) grew slower in April

Cash remittances grew by 4% to $2.441 billion in April from the $2.3 billion posted in the same month last year, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) reported on Monday.

Despite the year-on-year climb, the growth in money sent home by Filipinos abroad in April was slower than the 6.6% surge seen in March, which was due to a low base from a year earlier when the Philippine government imposed an employment ban to Kuwait.

The central bank attributed April’s increase to the 2.2% growth in remittances from land-based workers to $1.8 billion. Money sent home by sea-based workers also rose 10.6% to $600 million during the month.

April’s haul brought the four-month cash remittances tally to $9.739 billion, 4.1% higher than the $9.353 billion recorded in the same period last year.

The central bank said bulk of the remittances came from United States, which had a 35.9% share in the January to April total. This was followed by Saudi Arabia, Singapore, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, Japan, Canada, Hong Kong, Qatar and Germany, which had a combined share of 78% of total cash remittances for first four months.

Meanwhile, personal remittances rose 3.7% to $2.713 billion in April from $2.616 billion in the same month in 2018.

Source: here