New Jersey government's March revenues came in 7% lower than expected, adding to the financial pressure on the state.
March collections were $1.914 billion, $145 million short of what Gov. Chris Christie had projected for the month on Feb. 25.
The bad news for New Jersey comes after all of the three major ratings agencies made clear they had growing pessimism about the state's finances. In December, Moody's Investors Service put a negative outlook on its Aa3 rating of the state's general obligation debt. In March, Fitch Ratings did the same on its AA-minus rating of the debt.
On April 9, Standard & Poor's downgraded New Jersey's GO rating to A-plus from AA-minus.
Furthermore, in early April the Office of Legislative Services, a body within New Jersey's legislature, said that it expected the current fiscal year to have $217 million less in revenues than Christie was expecting.
New tax return processing technology has led the state to distribute refund payments faster than anticipated, the state's Department of the Treasury said. "We anticipate as refund payments cool off, and final payments come in, net revenues will improve," department chief economist Charles Steindel said.
"Receipts of sales and real estate transaction taxes were likely held back by [unusually harsh] February weather," Steindel continued.
The Christie administration has already cut $700 million from its $33 billion budget to deal with lower than anticipated revenues. It also gained money through restructuring the state's tobacco bonds.
Unless revenues come in higher than projected from April to June, the government will have to figure out additional ways to increase revenue and/or decrease spending in the last three months of the fiscal year.
