HONG KONG, July 31 (Xinhua) — The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) government recorded a deficit of 10.8 billion HK dollars (1.38 billion U.S. dollars) for June, resulting in a deficit of 16.5 billion HK dollars for the quarter that ended on June 30, the Census and Statistics Department said on Thursday.

    The Financial Services and the Treasury Bureau said the government collected 10.2 billion HK dollars in revenue and spent 21 billion HK dollars in June.

    The deficit was recorded mainly because some major revenue items including salaries and profits taxes were mostly received towards the end of the financial year, which starts in April, it said.

    Spending for the first April-June quarter was 59.7 billion HK dollars and revenue was 43.2 billion HK dollars.

    Fiscal reserves stood at 476.4 billion HK dollars at the end of June.