The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) reported that the country’s outstanding external debt stood at $53.3 billion last year, lower by 1.1 percent from $53.9 billion in 2008.

BSP Governor Amando M. Tetangco Jr., said the debt stock declined as net inflows from non-bank public sector borrowers were negated by net repayments of banks including the central bank and other private sector borrowers.

“Increased resident investments in Philippine debt papers issued abroad as well as downward foreign exchange revaluation adjustments also contributed in offsetting the impact of new borrowings on the debt stock,” Tetangco said.

On a quarterly basis, however, the debt stock increased by 0.2 percent to $120 million from the US$53.1 billion recorded in September last year.

External debt refers to all types of borrowings by Philippine residents from non-residents that were approved and registered by the BSP.

“Major external debt indicators remained at prudent levels by the end of the year,” Tetangco said.

Gross international reserves (GIR) reached $44.2 billion last year and represented 11.1 times the level of short-term external debt based on original maturity, substantially better than the 8.4 and 5.4 ratios recorded in September 2009 and December 2008, respectively.

Total public sector external debt, meanwhile, increased by $1.5 billion to $41.8 billion due to net new borrowings obtained to finance development projects and other requirements of government.
Private sector external debt, however, declined to $11.4 billion from $13.5 billion in 2008 as repayments by both bank and non-bank borrowers exceeded loan availments.

The currency composition of external debt remained essentially denominated in US dollars with 49 percent, Japanese Yen with 28.6 percent and multi-currency loans from the Asian Development Bank and the World Bank with 12 percent. The rest of the accounts were denominated in 18 other currencies.