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Cft critical of St. Maarten’s financial reporting – StMaartenNews.com – News Views Reviews

17 June 2025
This content originally appeared on French Side News Archives - StMaartenNews.com.
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PHILIPSBURG –– St. Maarten has submitted its fourth execution report for 2024 to financial supervisor Cft, reporting a surplus for the year of 700,000 Caribbean guilders ($391.000). While the Cft considers this a positive sign, it does not entirely trust the numbers and it has asked Finance Minister Marinka Gumbs to provide additional information.

In a letter dated June 4, Cft president Lidewijde Ongering states that St. Maarten has submitted its fourth quarter report on May 21, three months after the legal deadline of February 11, 2025.

Another problem is that explanations are insufficient or completely lacking. Ongering furthermore mentions an issue with bank descriptions, that part of the country’s revenue is incorrectly classified and that therefore the insight in the realization of revenue is limited.

The fourth quarter report misses a multi-annual liquidity prognosis and an overview of available liquidity. This makes it impossible for the Cft to have an opinion about the country’s liquidity position.

St. Maarten reported 522 million guilders ($291.6 million) of revenue up to the fourth quarter, 24 million ($13.4 million) below the 2024 budget, but there is still a positive result of 700,000 guilders. The realization of revenue fell behind on practically all topics. The Cft expressed its concerns about the lack of revenue and it urges St. Maarten to introduce a tourism fee and general healthcare insurance and to make work of the collection of room taxes.

Expenditures stayed with 521 million guilders below the budgeted 547 million, mainly due to lower costs for good and services and for personnel. The lower costs for goods and services are, according to St. Maarten, due to the limited availability of liquidity.

In the field of investing the country is not doing too well either. The 2024 budget listed 280 million guilders ($156.4 million) of investments, of which 90 million ($50.3 million) was for delayed projects from 2023. Up to the fourth quarter, St. Maarten invested just 41 million ($22.9 million).

The financial supervisor also notes that there is hardly any progress with the improvement of financial management.

A final issue is the public sector. In spite of repeated requests, the Cft has not yet received the information about this sector for the years 2021 and 2022. The same information about the years 24 and 25 should have been submitted by April 1, 2023. All St. Maarten has done is submit a proposal to the Ministry of Home Affairs and the Central Bureau of Statistics in the Netherlands. It is currently unclear to the Cft when it can expect the establishment of the public sector.

Because of all this, the Cft is unable to establish whether St. Maarten meets the requirements for the interest-burden standard. The ceiling for expenditures on interest is defined in the consensus Kingdom Law Financial Supervision as 5 percent of the average (budgeted) revenue of the public sector over the current and the previous year.

Related article:
Opinion: Responsible bookkeeping

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