The remittances of emigrants fall 14.2% in August, the lowest since 2011 – Observer

The remittances of Portuguese emigrants fell by 14.2% in August, to 220,6 million euros, the lowest since 2011, while remittances from migrants decreased by 6.6%, to 46.5 million.

according To the data released this Thursday by the Bank of Portugal, the value sent by the Portuguese workers abroad was 220,6 million, showing a fall of 14.2% compared to 257,2 million euros sent in August of last year.

The numbers provided in the Statistical Bulletin of the central bank, the Portuguese also show that this decline marks the lowest value sent by the emigrants, in this month of the year, from August 2011, the month in which remittances amounted to 220,39 million euros.

Looking in the opposite direction, that is, to the money sent by foreigners to work in Portugal, the decline of 6.6%, to 46.5 million, is the biggest decline since at least 2010.

The remittances of Portuguese emigrants working in lusophone countries, however, rose by 0.9%, to 20.5 million euros in August, while the money sent by the workers from these african countries in Portugal fell by 11.3%.

according To the data released by the Bank of Portugal, the rise in remittances from emigrants in August compared with the same period of the previous year for the first time since 2013, the last summer before the descent of the price of the raw materials and the consequent economic crisis in the world’s largest producers of oil in Africa.

In August 2013, the shipments had increased from 26.4 million in the same period of the previous year, to 26.8 million euros, and began the descent to 23.6 in 2014 and 20.3 in August of last year.

Angola, the only country singularizado in the data of the Bank of Portugal, and that represents almost all of the remittances of emigrants in the Portuguese-speaking countries in Africa, has been closely monitoring these values and with the same trend, that is, August marked the first month in which the remittances of the emigrants have risen over the same period since 2013.

In the inverse sense, of the african workers of PALOP in Portugal, there has been a decrease of 11.3%, but the values are significantly smaller: remittances increased from 4.4 million in August of 2015, to 3.9 million in August this year.