Not the kind of high we want; PH debt soars to ₱11.16-T

Data from the Treasury Bureau published Thursday (July 29) revealed the national debt stock reached ₱11.16 trillion by the end of the month, breaching the previous ₱11.07 trillion record high logged in May.

AMID continuing concerns over the country’s ability to recover from the economic impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic, intensive borrowing by the government for its pandemic response has pushed the country’s outstanding loans into a “new high.”

23.3-percent jump

The latest figure is also a 23.3-percent jump from the ₱9.05 trillion figure recorded as of end-June last year.

Both local and foreign borrowings rose during the month compared to end-May’s levels, the bureau also observed.

Domestic loans reached ₱7.93 trillion as of end-June or 0.3 percent higher than the previous month’s tally, while external loans, meanwhile, climbed 2.3 percent to ₱3.22 trillion month-on-month.

Peso depreciation

The treasury noted that the rise in the country’s debt was due to the impact of the deprecation of the Philippine peso against the U.S. dollar, which amounted to ₱64.86 billion, as well as net availment of foreign loans amounting to ₱25.52 billion.

These were offset by the ₱18.27 billion drop in the peso value of loans denominated in other currencies like the euro and yen due to currency appreciation.

The government’s guaranteed obligations also went up by 2.8 percent in June, reaching ₱438.6 billion by the end of the month.

The bureau said this was due to the net availment of ₱11.07 billion worth of local guarantees, along with the impact of local currency depreciation reaching ₱3.98 billion.

The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) has earlier said the emergence of the new Covid-19 Delta variant and the imposition of a lockdown in key areas could pose a serious challenge to the country's economic stability.

(ONT/With report from CNN Philippines)

Tags: #BureauOfTheTreasury, #nationaldebt, #Covid19, #pandemicresponse, #economy