Speaking at a news conference in Canberra on Monday, Australia Treasurer Jim Chalmers said that he expects that the country’s budget surplus will be set at around AUD20 billion.

"The current expectation of the officials is that the surplus for 2022-2023 will be around twenty billion dollars, or more likely just north of that figure," Chalmers noted.

In June, Chalmers had signaled that Australia's budget surplus for 2022/23 will be bigger than the AUD4.2 billion (USD2.81 billion) projected in the May budget.

Market reaction

Following the above comments, AUD/USD is holding higher ground near 0.6740, up 0.15% so far.