The Bank of Lithuania is set to transfer 130.04 million euros into the state’s coffers, nine times more than last year, after posting an audited net profit of 143.74 million euros in 2024, a sixfold increase from 2023.
“The year 2024 was exceptional for the Bank of Lithuania – not just over a five-year span, but the best in the past 15 years,” central bank governor Gediminas Šimkus told a press conference on Tuesday.
“The Bank of Lithuania’s contribution this year is nearly the same as the total amount the state expects to collect from dividends and profit contributions by state-owned enterprises. The 2025 budget bill projects this amount to be around 131 million euros,” he said.
The governor added that 116 million euros of the 130-million-euro contribution is expected to go into the State Defence Fund.
According to Šimkus, last year’s profit growth was driven by the management of financial assets, as favourable conditions in international securities and currency markets allowed the bank to achieve strong investment results.
“Another factor is that the Bank of Lithuania has been reliably managing financial assets for years, building up and maintaining adequate risk reserves, which allows it to offset risks from investments and the implementation of monetary policy,” he said.
In early April, the parliament passed an amendment allowing a larger share of the central bank’s profit to be paid into the state budget, with part of the funds to go toward defence.
Under the new rules, after setting aside the necessary portion of the central bank’s annual profit for its reserve capital, the rest will be transferred to the state budget, replacing the previous provision that limited the contribution to 70 percent of the average profit over the past three financial years.
According to the central bank, without this change, it would have been allowed to transfer no more than 39 million euros for 2024.
Newsletter
Every Friday morning.
