Deficit of the current account of the balance of payments for the 4^th quarter of 2008 comprised 409.3 million USD, which is 42.3 percent less than the indicator for the previous quarter and 48.5 percent less than in the same period of the previous year.

Trading with goods, exports as well as imports had decreased. In particular, export has decreased by 41.2 percent than in the 3^th quarter and by 30.4 percent than in the same period of the 2007. And Import has decreased by 9.0 and 10.6 percent accordingly. The sizeable lowering of export has resulted the growth of deficit and in the reporting period it equals 1044.4 million USD – 16.8 percent more than in the previous quarter and 1.1 percent more as compared to the same quarter of the previous year.

The service balance is positive as usual and equals to 2.9 million USD. In which exports of services is 302.0 million USD (has decreased by 7.3 percent to the 3^rd quarter of 2008 and increased by 2.2 percent to the same period of 2007) and import of services is 299.1 1 million USD (has decreased by 12.0 percent to the previous quarter and increased by 1.4 percent to the 4^th quarter of the previous year).

In the trade with services usually the tourism service has notable positive balance, but in the 4^th quarter of 2008 it has decreased by 6.7 percent as compared to the same quarter of 2007 and by 30.5 as compared to the previous quarter. The second positive component of services, communication services has decreased by 31.1 percent to the 3 ^rd quarter and has increased by 3.1 times to the same quarter of 2007. The insurance, other business, transportation and construction service balances has a negative feature (-32.8, -7.9, -6.1, and -2.2 million USD accordingly).

In the 4^th quarter of 2008 balance of income is highest and equals to 132.3 million USD. Income credit is 129.2 million USD that is 0.5 percent less than in the previous quarter and 0.3 percent less than in the same period of 2007. The positive income debit (3.1 million USD) which has firstly took place in our BOP is due to negative reinvestment.

Volume of current transfers is the highest positive component of the current balance of payments constituting 499.9 million of USD, from which the inflow is 521.3 million of USD and the outflow - 21.4 million of USD. During the 4^th quarter of 2008, the current transfers of the government sector has increased 5.7 times as compared to the last quarter of the current year and has reached 294.9 million of USD. With regards to transfers of other sector, it has increased 1.2 times as compared to the 3^nd quarter and equaled 205.0 million of USD. Such an increase in the government sector's current transfers is the result of overseas aids of donor countries.

Capital transfers for the 4^th quarter of 2008 make up 45.8 million of USD and they are grown 1.9 times as compared to the last quarter and 1.5 times if we compare them to the same period of the year 2007. During the reporting period, the government sectors' capital transfers equals 40.3 million of USD, that is 2 times higher as compared to the previous quarter as well as compared to the analogous period of the last year.

During the 4^th quarter of 2008, direct investments have increased by 25.5 percent and comprised 188.3 million of USD. But this figure is lower by 67.9 percent comparing to the same period of 2007. Investments have increased in both in the equity capital and other capital, while reinvested income has decreased sharply (151.6 million of USD).