In an economic bulletin, Finance Undersecretary and chief economist Gil Beltran said the debt-to-GDP ratio expanded to 44 percent as of end-March 2019 from 42.6 percent in the same period last year. “Net debt or debt net of cash balance is a stronger determinant of emerging country spreads than gross debt based on the IMF(International Monetary Fund) Working Paper ‘Does Gross or Net Debt Matter More for Emerging Market Spreads?’, by Metodij Hadzi-Vaskov and Luca Antonio Ricci published in Dec. 2016,” he said. Debt-to-GDP ratio is an indicator used by debt watchers and credit rating agencies to assess a country’s debt sustainability. Meanwhile, Beltran said the country’s net debt-to-revenue ratio in the first quarter dropped to 238.3 percent from 249.7 percent last year. “In general, first quarter 2019 debt statistics show continuation of the favorable trend toward debt reduction.

Source: Philippine Star May 23, 2019 16:00 UTC