US federal government posts $70.5bn budget surplus in June

The U.S. federal government posted a budget surplus of 70.5 billion U.S. dollars in June, and the budget deficit for the first nine months of the current fiscal year declined significantly, the U.S. Treasury Department said on Friday.
The federal government revenue was 323.6 billion dollars in June, up 13 percent from the same period a year ago, while spending totaled 253.1 billion dollars, 83 billion dollars more than a year earlier, the department said in a report.
The combined budget deficit in the first nine months of the current fiscal year, which ends at the end of September, stood at 365.9 billion dollars, 28 percent lower than a year earlier. That is the smallest year-to-date budget deficit since 2008.
In its latest estimate, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) forecasted the deficit would total 492 billion dollars in the current fiscal year, lower than a record high of 1.4 trillion dollars in 2009.
This year's deficit would equal 2.8 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP), down from the 4.1 percent in 2013, according to the CBO projection.
As revenue increased and spending dwindled, the U.S. federal government budget deficit fell to 680 billion dollars for the 2013 fiscal year, the smallest in five years.