SANTO DOMINGO.-The Central Bank of the Dominican Republic (BCRD) anticipates that significant flows of remittances generated by tourism revenue, foreign direct investment, and exports will continue throughout 2023. According to the regulatory body, these foreign exchange earnings will continue to contribute to the relative stability of the current exchange rate.
Yesterday, the financial institution reported that the national currency appreciated by 0.5% during the month of January and that remittances received in the Dominican Republic during the past month amounted to 802.0 million dollars, exhibiting a 5.6% year-on-year growth, with 42.7 million more than those received in 2022 and 9.2 million additional with respect to 2021.
These remittance flows during the first month of the year continued the growth trend observed since the beginning of the last quarter of 2022, with increases of 0.3%, 0.1% and 0.4% in October, November and December, respectively, the entity indicated in a press release.
The amount recorded in January is almost double the average value in the same month for the pre-pandemic period of 2015-2019, which was 439.1 million, generating a multiplier effect on consumption, investment and financing of the most vulnerable sectors that have these resources supplied by the diaspora.
According to the Central Bank of the Dominican Republic (BCRD), 83.3% of formal flows for January came from the United States, totaling $544.9 million. The BCRD highlighted that the US economy grew by 2.1%, according to its Economic Analysis Office, while unemployment in January 2023 stood at 3.4%, the lowest in more than 50 years.
Remittances received from Spain in January reached $45.2 million, 6.9% of the total, making it the second country in terms of total residents of the Dominican diaspora, followed by Haiti and Italy, with 1.2% and 1.0% of the flows received, respectively.
The institution highlighted that the greater flows of external income allowed the accumulation of international reserves at the end of January of over 14.6 billion dollars, 12.1% of GDP, a metric that exceeds the levels recommended by the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
