The surplus accounted for 15.2 percent of the OPEC member’s gross domestic product, according to Reuters calculations. It stood at 3.2 billion dinars in the same period a year ago and at 4.2 billion in April-May.

Revenue of the world’s sixth-largest oil exporter was 7.1 billion dinars in April-June, while spending came at 1.5 billion dinars, below a projected 4.8 billion, the data showed. 

Oil revenue reached 6.8 billion dinars in April-June, accounting for 96 percent of the total. The 2011-12 budget is based on an oil price of $60 per barrel. 

Brent crude prices have been floating between $98 and $127 per barrel since the fiscal year started in April. 

On Thursday, oil prices fell over $3 per barrel with US futures touching $82.75 per barrel as a combination of signals heightened worries about global economic growth.

Since 2004, Kuwait’s budget spending has tripled to a record 19.4 billion dinars planned for the 2011-12 fiscal year, which started in April, with expenditure on wages rising almost as fast.

Revenue was set at 13.4 billion dinars in the 2011-12 budget, approved by parliament in June, bringing the projected deficit to 5.99 billion, or 16.2 percent of gross domestic product, according to Reuters calculations. 

However, the 2011-12 revenue estimate is very conservative given this year’s surge in the price of oil.  

A Reuters poll in June forecast Kuwait’s economy would grow 4.4 percent in 2011 and generate a fiscal surplus of 20.2 percent of gross domestic product in 2011-12.