LatinNews Regional Monitor: Caribbean & Central America - 21 November 2018

* Costa Rica’s finance ministry has released new figures which show that Costa Rica’s fiscal deficit reached 5.09% of GDP in the first ten months of 2018, up from 4.66% in the same period in 2017. The latest figures come as the government led by President Carlos Alvarado is seeking to push through a fiscal reform initiative that seeks to address the country’s widening fiscal deficit, which closed at 6.2% of GDP in 2017. Approved in a preliminary debate by the 57-member unicameral national legislature last month, the initiative, which has been rejected by the supreme court (CSJ), would replace the current 13% sales tax with a 13% value-added tax (VAT) and increase the number of products and services to be taxed among other things.

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