The National Treasury Secretariat reported this Thursday (28) that government accounts registered a primary surplus of R$ 14.433 billion. This is the biggest surplus for the month since the beginning of the historical series, in 1997. With the June result, the Central Government closed the first semester with a positive result of R$ 53.614 billion. This is the third best result in history for the period, second only to 2008 and 2011. The primary result represents the difference between revenues and expenditures, disregarding the payment of interest on the public debt.
Despite the surplus accumulated in the year, the Budget Guidelines Law (LDO) stipulates a primary deficit target of R$ 170.5 billion for this year. Last week, the Bimonthly Report of Income and Expenses reduced the deficit estimate to R$ 59.354 billion. However, the value taken into account for the fulfillment of fiscal targets is that of the LDO. The reduction in the deficit forecast occurred even with the constitutional amendment that will increase social spending by R$ 41.25 billion in the second half of the year.
The increase in net revenue can be explained by the receipt of R$ 26.6 billion in concession bonuses from Eletrobras and the increase of R$ 25.8 billion in the receipt of dividends from state-owned companies. Dividends are the portion of profit that a company distributes to shareholders. In the case of state-owned companies, as the largest shareholder is the Union, the government keeps most of the dividends.
On the expenditure side, the main factor that contributed to the decrease in spending in June was the installment payment of court orders. Established by a constitutional amendment approved at the end of last year, the postponement of large-value precatories made the government save R$ 10 billion last month, discounting inflation. With information from Agência Brasil.
