YEREVAN, 2 September. /ARKA/. Armenia’s public debt at the end of the first half of 2024 stood at over 4.7 trillion drams (the equivalent $12.1 billion of USD), Armenian Finance Minister Vahe Hovhannisyan said.
According to him, the debt is within manageable limits. ‘It is noteworthy that the average maturity has slightly decreased compared to the beginning of the year, reaching 7.1 years, while the target is 7-10 years,’ Hovhannisyan told a meeting of the parliamentary committee on financial and budgetary issues.
According to him, this is due to the recent years’ policy of issuing shorter-term government bonds, which has been driven by higher interest rates. He said eExchange rate risks are manageable either because the share of domestic debt is consistently growing and currently stands at 50.7 per cent.
The Minister noted that in the coming years the state budget is expected to be heavily burdened with debt servicing, in particular, early next year the repayment of Eurobonds worth more than $300 million is scheduled.
At the same time, he noted that the government planned to issue bonds worth 94.3 billion drams, but issued 128.4 billion drams worth bonds, prompted by the high demand.
‘We tried to satisfy investors’ demands, as well as increase liquidity in the market,’ Hovhannisyan said.
According to a Ministry of Economy report, as of late August, 2024 the country’s external debt stood at about $6.3 billion (3.0% decrease compared to June 2023), while domestic debt stood at about $6 billion (26.7% increase). -0-
