The Philippines' balance of payments (BOP) stood at a surplus of 129 million U.S. dollars in July, bringing the cumulative surplus for the first seven months to 2.16 billion U.S. dollars, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) , or the Philippine Central Bank said on Wednesday.

The cumulative surplus level is the highest since January this year as inflows from remittances, direct investments and borrowings remained steady, the BSP said.

The July surplus was, however, lower than the 232 million U.S. dollars posted a month earlier due to debt payments and slower portfolio investments, said the BSP.

The BSP said the BOP, which records an economy's transactions with the rest of the world, was boosted primarily by remittances which grew by more than 15 percent to six billion U.S. dollars in the first six months.

For the first seven months, the government also borrowed a total of 2.56 billion U.S. dollars, beefing up the surplus.

Moreover, the BSP's income from its investments rose by 64 percent to 565 million U.S. dollars in January-July, also helping lift the BOP surplus to its 7-month high.

Meanwhile, a total of 3.9 billion U.S. dollars came out of the country for payments to maturing debts of the national government.

The BSP's gross international reserves stood at an all-time high of 21.164 billion U.S. dollars in end-July.

The BSP is expecting to breach its 1.6 billion U.S. dollars BOP surplus forecast this year on increased capital flows from investments and remittances.

The BOP yielded a surplus of 2.4 billion U.S. dollars in 2005.

Source: Xinhua