MANILA — Money sent home by overseas Filipinos climbed to $2.7 billion in April, a 2 percent increase from the same month a year earlier, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas said Monday.
Preliminary data from the Philippine central bank showed cash remittances surpassed the $2.6 billion recorded in April 2025, with the BSP attributing the gain to the continued resilience of overseas Filipino workers despite challenging global economic conditions.
Personal remittances — a broader measure that includes transfers through banks, informal channels, and goods sent from abroad — rose 2.1 percent year-on-year to $3.04 billion in April, up from $2.97 billion in the same period last year.
For the first four months of 2026, personal remittances grew 2.7 percent to $12.70 billion, while cash remittances increased 2.6 percent to $11.40 billion, the BSP said.
The United States remained the largest source of remittance inflows, followed by Singapore and Saudi Arabia, reflecting what the central bank described as a stable geographic concentration of overseas Filipino workers.
Michael Ricafort, chief economist at Rizal Commercial Banking Corporation, said the figures pointed to an economy still drawing meaningful support from its overseas workforce.
“The continued single-digit year-on-year growth in OFW remittances nevertheless is still a good signal for the overall economy as an important growth driver, especially in terms of consumer spending, which accounts for at least 70 percent of the Philippine economy,” Ricafort said in an email.
He cautioned, however, that remittance growth could slow if geopolitical tensions in the Middle East escalate, potentially weighing on global economic expansion and reducing demand for Filipino labor abroad.
Remittances are a critical pillar of the Philippine economy, consistently ranking among the country’s top sources of foreign exchange.
