Gov’t debt slightly fell in Sept on loan repayments

MANILA  -The government’s debt burden slightly eased in September due to repayments of old liabilities during the month, the Bureau of the Treasury reported Tuesday.

The debt pile amounted to P14.27 trillion in September, down 0.6 percent or by P80.9 billion from the previous month, but up by 5.6 percent from the same month last year, data showed.

So far this year, obligations have accumulated by 6.3 percent or P849.81 billion.

Figures showed local debts, which accounted for 68.2 percent of total borrowings, inched down 0.6 percent month-on-month in September after the government paid P177.9 billion that it owed to domestic creditors.

Minimal effect

At the same time, the peso’s weakness against the US dollar “had minimal effect on debt stock valuation”, the Treasury explained.

Year-to-date, domestic debt has piled up by P526 billion or 5.7 percent.

Foreign debts, meanwhile, were trimmed down by 0.5 percent to P4.53 trillion in September after the government repaid P8 billion more foreign loans than it had freshly borrowed offshore during the month.

To recall, the Treasury raised $611.2 million via the sale of retail onshore dollar bonds in late September.

The depreciation of third currencies like euro and Japanese yen against the US dollar also cut the state’s external debt by P16.9 billion, although the peso’s weakness against the greenback added P0.7 billion to the pile.

Since the beginning of the year, foreign debts have accumulated by 7.7 percent or P323.8 billion.

The government borrows money from creditors at home and abroad to bridge its budget gap, which is capped at P1.5 trillion this year.

Analysts have said the Marcos administration would face costlier debts in the coming months as the economy absorbs the aggressive tightening actions of the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas amid stubbornly-high inflation.