Qatar’s Q1 budget surplus exceeds expectations at $5.4bn

Qatar’s Finance Ministry has announced that the country has registered over two-thirds of its expected 2023 budget surplus in the first quarter of the year, thanks to a large inflow of oil and gas revenues. The country’s trade balance was 19.7 billion Qatari riyals ($5.4 billion) in the black for Q1, equivalent to 68% of its anticipated budget surplus for 2023. The total revenues in the first three months of 2023 reached 68.6 billion riyals, with 63.4 billion coming from oil and gas revenues. The Gulf nation was expected to record a budget surplus of 29 billion riyals by the end of 2023.