Turkish government gross debt stock up in July

ANKARA – Anadolu Agency

The Turkish government’s gross debt stock surpassed 1 trillion Turkish liras (nearly $203 billion) at the end of July, the Treasury and Finance Ministry announced on Monday.

Last month, the gross debt stock -- the outstanding debt of public sector institutions, the Central Bank, private companies and households -- rose 23.5 percent year-on-year, compared to 817.3 billion Turkish liras (around $232.8 billion) of debt stock in July 2017.

Some 571.3 billion Turkish liras (around $116.3 billion) or 57 percent of the debt was denominated in local currency, while 438.3 billion liras (around $89 billion) of debt was in foreign currency.

On a monthly basis, the central government debt stock rose by 3 percent, up from 969.8 billion Turkish liras (nearly $209 billion) at the end of June.

The stock of Treasury receivables amounted to 18.3 billion Turkish liras (some $3.7 billion) as of July 31.

"Local Governments with the stock of 11.6 billion liras ($2.36 billion) hold the largest share of Treasury receivables," it said.

The total amount of receivables collected by the Treasury stood at 1.1 billion liras ($224 million) by the end of July.

One U.S. dollar was traded for 4.91 Turkish liras as of end of the last month, while the average U.S. dollar/Turkish lira exchange rate was 3.51 as of end of July 2017, according to the Turkish Central Bank.

As of Dec. 31, 2017, the Turkish government’s gross debt stock amounted to nearly 876.5 billion Turkish liras ($227.6 billion), while the figure was around 760 billion Turkish liras ($217.1 billion) at the end of the previous year.