Remittances up 5.4% to $2.5B in Feb. —BSP

Remittances from overseas Filipinos (OFs) were higher in February from a year earlier, data released by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) on Monday revealed.

Personal remittances grew by 5.4 percent to $2.528 billion in February from $2.320 billion in the same month last year.

Personal remittances include transfers in cash, or in-kind, or via informal channels.

The central noted that personal remittances totaled $5.182 billion in the first two months of the year, up 8.1 percent or $4794 billion year-on-year.

Land-based workers with work contracts of one year of more sent home $4.0 billion, up 6.5 percent, while sea-based and land-based workers with work contracts of less than transferred $1.0 billion, up 9.7 percent, the BSP noted.

Meanwhile, cash remittances grew by 4.5 percent to $2.267 billion in February, from $2.169 billion in February 2017, but were down from $2.379 billion in January.

“The United States, United Arab Emirates, Germany, and Malaysia were the major contributors to the growth in cash remittances for the month,” the BSP said.

Remittances from the UAE and the US both contributed 1.2 percentage points to the overall growth, while Germany and Malaysia each shared 1.0 percentage points. —Jon Viktor Cabuenas/VDS, GMA News