The remittances sent by overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) to their families in the Philippines rose in October, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) reported on Monday, December 17.
According to BSP, remittances for the month of October totaled $2.757 billion, higher than the $2.552 billion total from October 2017 and $2.490 billion from September 2018.
“Personal remittances from land-based OFs with work contracts of one year or more posted an increase of 2.8 percent (at $20.3 billion), while those from sea-based and land-based OFs with work contracts of less than one year increased by 4.2 percent (at $5.5 billion) for January to October of 2018,” BSP Governor Nestor Espenilla Jr. said in a statement.
BSP said that OFWs from countries like the UAE, the United States, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Japan, the United Kingdom, Canada, Germany and Hong Kong make up 79 percent of the total remittances this year.
OFW remittances is expected to recover in the following months as the holiday season approaches which is expected to strengthen peso by year-end.
The BSP projects remittances to grow by 3 percent on average for 2018.
