Vietnam sees $4.66bn in state budget deficit in 7 months

Vietnam's state budget deficit reached 100.68 trillion Vietnamese dong (4.66 billion U.S. dollars) in the first seven months of 2015, accounting for 44.5 percent of the whole year's estimate, according to Vietnam's Ministry of Finance (MoF) on Friday.

During the seven-month period, the government generated total revenues of some 544.6 trillion Vietnamese dong (25.21 billion U.S. dollars), up 6.6 percent year-on-year, making up 59.8 percent of the whole year's estimate.

Meanwhile, expenditures hit 645.3 trillion Vietnamese dong (29. 87 billion U.S. dollars) in January-July period, up 8.1 percent year-on-year, accounting for 56.3 percent of this year's estimate, local Thanh Nien (Young People) online newspaper quoted the MoF as saying on Friday.

Official statistics showed that in 2012, Vietnam's state budget deficit accounted for 4.8 percent of the country's gross domestic product (GDP). In 2013, the figure hiked to 6.6 percent while that of 2014 was 5.3 percent of GDP.

This year, Vietnam targeted to control its state budget deficit at around 5 percent of GDP.