Cardinal George Pell Rides Currency to Shrinking Vatican Deficit

By Tess Livingstone
The Australian
July 17, 2015

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Vatican financial chief George Pell last night put his colleagues in the Holy See on notice — the Holy See’s deficit needs to be ­addressed.

The Vatican released its most comprehensive and transparent balance sheet and the ­financial picture is mixed.

The Vatican deficit fell from ˆ37.2 million ($54.7m) in 2013 to ˆ25.6m last year. The 30 per cent improvement was mainly due to currency fluctuations that boosted returns on investments.

“But we can’t continue like this for too much longer,’’ Cardinal Pell said in Rome last night.

No staff would be made ­redundant, the Australian said, but reorganisation of investments, staff development and economies would be needed.

A working group has been set up to identify changes to ­improve investment returns.

“We’ve also got to make our investments work harder,’’ Dr Pell said.