Statistics Iceland releases now an aggregated overview of quarterly central and local government non-financial accounts for the 3rd quarter and accumulated figures for the first three quarters. The figures are on accruals basis. These quarterly overviews are published 90 days after the end of the respective quarter.

The accounts for the central government are based on information from the Government Financial Management Authority but the data for local government are based on a sample of accounts from seven municipalities with 50% of the population in Iceland. These have been grossed up by Statistics Iceland. So far the break-down of the data is rather limited but there are plans for providing more detailed data in the future.

The central government revenue for the third quarter of 2004 amounted to 78.4 billion ISK and the financial balance was positive by 0.4 billion ISK. Local government revenue amounted to 21.6 billion ISK and the financial balance was positive by 0.9 billion ISK. In total the financial balance of general government was positive by 1.3 billion ISK, 1.3% of current revenue and 0.1% of annual GDP.

In the figures presented here, both revenue and expenditure figures are recorded on  accruals basis whereas the monthly figures published by the the Government Financial Authority are on  cash basis. Accruals basis means that flows are recorded when they are established regardless of when the actual payment is made. The data presented here, both for central and local government, are preliminary. In particular, the information on investment of the local government is sketchy.

Accumulated data for the first three quarters render the following overview of the general government finances.

In the first three quarters of 2004, the general government accounts on accruals basis showed a deficit of 7.1 billion ISK, which corresponds to 0.8 per cent of GDP. As a share of current revenue, the financial balance was negative by 2.6% with the local government showing a somewhat larger deficit than the central government.

The quarterly data published here are based on accounting methods followed by the central and local government but not according to national accounting methods. Therefore these figures  are not fully compatible with the annual government finance statistics published by Statistics Iceland.

Statistics (See: "Quarterly non-financial accounts for general government 2004")