By G. Palaitsakis
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State revenues missed targets in several primaries categories over the first two months of the year, such as income tax, VAT remittances and special consumer taxes, negatively affecting the overall course of revenues in the 2017 state budget.
Nevertheless, overall targets were bolstered by a greater than expected dividend by the Bank of Greece (BoG) flowing in state coffers and revenue from the voluntary revelation of untaxed income by taxpayers in numerous cases involving the tax bureau and custom service from previous years.
The final component in ensuring that the leftist Greek government continue to post a primary budget surplus above 430 million euros in the state budget for the first two months of the year was a partial "payment stop" on state arrears. The overall primary budget surplus reached 2.1 billion euros.
Total revenues from income taxes, VAT remittances, as well as special taxes on tobacco products, fuels and other affected products were down by 431 million euros from the target over the Jan-Feb 2017 period.
