Gov’t debt-to-GDP ratio down

Gov’t debt-to-GDP ratio down (Photo by Allan Ajifo [CC BY 2.0 (Photo by Allan Ajifo [CC BY 2.0)

In a statement Thursday, Department of Finance (DOF) Undersecretary Gil Beltran said this development came amid the rise of the GG to trillion-level at Php 5.022 trillion from year-ago’s Php 4.819 trillion.

“Despite the rise in nominal debt, the GG debt-to-GDP ratio has gone down to 35.5 percent from 36.7 percent in the third quarter 2015 due to the sustained improvement in the economy,” he said.

GG debt covers the outstanding obligations of the National Government (NG), the Central Bank Board of Liquidators (CB-BOL), social security institutions (SSIs) and the local government units (LGUs), excluding the intra-sector debt holdings of government securities including those with the Bond Sinking Fund (BSF).

Beltran attributed the rise in GG debt partly to the 2.5 percent increase in outstanding liabilities of the national government to Php 6.087 trillion from the Php 5.936 trillion in end-September 2015.

He said liabilities of the national government, excluding BSF holdings, reached Php 5.447 trillion, up 3.9 percent compared to the Php 5.242 trillion same period in 2015 due to deprecation of the peso and lower BSF holdings.

He said liabilities of LGUs increased by 11.4 percent to Php 77.3 billion as of last September against the Php 69.4 billion same period last year.

“The increase in borrowings are to be used for procurement, financing public services as well as economic enterprises,” he said.

The DOF official said intrasector debt holdings amounted to Php 503.1 billion as of end-September 2016, higher by two percent against year-ago’s Php 493.0 billion after “social security institutions increased their holdings of Government Securities by Php 10.1 billion.”