Turkey projects foreign debt payment at $10.8 billion in 2019

ANKARA - Anadolu Agency

The Turkish Treasury on Nov. 1 forecasted the foreign debt payment to total $10.8 billion for next year.

The total amount of debt service is projected to realize at 224.8 billion Turkish Liras ($40.4 billion) in 2019, the Treasury and Finance Ministry said in an online statement.

“Total domestic debt service is expected to realize as 164.6 billion liras [$30 billion], while total external debt service is expected to be at 60.2 billion liras [$10.8 billion],” according to the Treasury Financing Program.

The payments of principal would total 118.1 billion liras ($21.2 billion) with interest at 106.7 billion liras ($19.2 billion).

Some “25.8 billion liras [$4.63 billion] of the total financing need in 2019 is expected to be met through non-borrowing resources, including the cash primary surplus, privatization revenues, the revenues from 2-B land sales, the Savings Deposit Insurance Fund transfers, receipts from on-lent and guaranteed debt and use of cash account,” it said.

The Treasury planned to borrow 199 billion liras ($35.7 billion) in 2019, according to the program.

It plans to provide the equivalent of $8 billion in external funding next year through bond issuances in international capital markets.

The total amount of domestic borrowing was estimated to be 153.9 billion liras ($27.6 billion) in 2019.

For 2018, the Treasury estimated that total borrowing would increase to nearly 180 billion liras ($31.3 billion) from 163.8 billion liras ($42.7 billion), as initially planned.