Money sent home by overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) hit a two-month high in September, according to data from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) released on Monday.
Personal remittances — cash or kind transfers between families — totaled $3.02 billion in September, 4.8-percent higher than the $2.88 billion recorded in the same month last year.
It was also up from the $2.8 billion in August and the highest since the $3.16 billion in July.
The latest data brought the year-to-date figure to $25.69 billion, up by 5.7 percent compared to the $24.30 billion in 2020.
The year-on-year increase was due to the growth in remittances from land-based based OFWs with contracts of one year or more which grew by 6.2 percent to $2.34 billion from $2.20 billion.
The increase was also attributed to the 1.7 percent growth in remittances of sea-and land-based workers with work contracts of less than one year.
Cash remittances, which only include money sent through banks, reached $2.73 billion in September, up from the $2.60 billion in September last year and the $2.609 billion in August this year.
The expansion in cash remittances was due to the increase in receipts from land-based and sea-based workers, which rose by 6.2 percent to $2.156 billion from $2.03 billion and 1.9 percent to $581 million from $570 million, respectively.
On a year-to-date basis, cash remittances reached $23.11 billion, 5.6-percent higher than the year-ago level of $21.88 billion.
"The growth in cash remittances from the United States, Malaysia, Taiwan and South Korea contributed largely to the increase in remittances in January-September 2021," the central bank said.
According to the central bank, the United States accounted for about 40.8 percent of total OFW remittances country sources.
Singapore, Saudi Arabia, Japan, the United Kingdom, the United Arab Emirates, Canada, Taiwan, Qatar and South Korea followed.
Source: Manila Times and BSP