The government’s outstanding debt expanded to a record-high P10.02 trillion at end-October as domestic and foreign borrowings rose, according to the Bureau of the Treasury (BTr).
Latest Treasury bureau data showed on Friday that the amount was a 7.03-percent or P658.81-billion increase from P9.36 trillion at end-September.
Of the figure, 28.4 percent was generated from external creditors and 71.6 percent was raised locally.
Local debt reached P7.07 trillion, a 9.92-percent rise from end-September’s P6.43 trillion, while foreign debt inched up by 0.68 percent to P2.95 trillion.
Outstanding obligations a year ago were at P7.90 trillion, of which P5.30 trillion were domestic and P2.60 trillion were foreign.
The Treasury blamed the high local debt to “additional short-term borrowing availed from the BSP (Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas), alongside the net issuance of domestic government securities.”
In October, the government and the central bank entered a fresh repurchase agreement, under which the BSP purchased P540 billion worth of government securities from the BTr.
Domestic gross borrowings hit P2.26 trillion at end-October. Net Treasury bills totaled P420.31 billion, while Treasury bonds and retail Treasury bonds reached P561.91 billion and P738.54 billion, respectively, net of the P88.56-billion domestic bond exchange.
The Treasury traced the wider foreign obligations to “the P18.98 billion net availment of external loans and P2.42-billion net appreciation of third currency against the US dollar, offsetting the effect of local-currency appreciation amounting to P1.57 billion.”
The government’s external financing reached an inflow of P574.43.
A foreign-exchange rate of P48.39 to the dollar was used for the latest data, compared with end-September’s P48.42 :$1. The exchange rate used a year earlier was P50.76:$1.
As of end-October, gross national government financing reached P2.83 billion, according to the BTr.
Meanwhile, government-guaranteed obligations inched up by 0.55 percent or P2.45 billion to P447.84 billion at end-October.
“The increment was due to the net availment of domestic guarantees amounting to P1.83 billion and the net effect of third-currency appreciation against the USD that increase the value of external guarantees by P0.77 billion,” the bureau explained.
These more than offset the P0.15 billion effect of local currency appreciation and repayment of external guarantees, it said.
Data from the Department of Budget and Management showed earlier that state debt is seen to hit P10.16 trillion by yearend. If correct, it would be 31.42-percent higher than the P7.73-trillion liabilities at the end of last year.