Wyoming Revenues Strong Due to Mining

Money continued to flow into Wyoming's main checking account in April at a pace ahead of the state's Consensus Revenue Estimating Group (CREG) forecast. Jim Robinson, Senior Economist with the state's Economic Analysis Division says General Fund revenues are leading for forecast by about 4%, or about $39 million.

Robinson says Sales and Use tax revenues are also running ahead of the forecast by $10 million, or 2.3%. Robinson says a number of industry sectors are showing improvement compared to 2010, but the mining sector alone has rebounded by 46.1%.

Robinson says revenues from severance taxes and royalties are benefiting primarily from Wyoming’s natural gas prices being better than expected. Robinson says the average price of Opal Hub gas through April was $4.00 per thousand cubic feet (mcf) while CREG’s estimate for the 2011 calendar year is $3.90 per mcf.