Bulgaria’s current account deficit for the first nine months of 2006 is going up to reach 11 per cent of the GDP or 2.66 billion euro, Bulgarian National Bank data shows.

For the same period last year it totalled 7.3 per cent of the GDP or 1.57 billion euro, Dnevnik newspaper reported.

Economists predicted that the annual deficit would reach 15 per cent of the GDP.

Investment growth and strict fiscal policies were sufficient to counter the negative percentage, economists said.

Direct foreign investment has reached the record high 13.2 per cent or 3.2 billion euro. The sum covers more than 120 per cent of the deficit.

Misbalance resulted from customer credits, which in turn resulted in import increase. Together with the high energy prices this increase furthered the current account deficit, Dnevnik reported.

Dynamic development normally resulted in high deficit, economist Dimitar Chobanov said. The fact that the country managed to attract significant foreign investment meant that foreign companies had trust in the local business environment, said he.