Japanese yen banknotes are pictured in this undated file photo (Photo: AFP) Jakarta (VNA) – The Indonesian Finance Ministry announced on July 3 that the country has raised 100 billion JPY (930 million USD) from the issuance of five-tranche Samurai bonds to offset the national budget deficit and fund the response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
In its statement, the ministry said this is the first issuance of the sovereign Japanese yen in 2020 and the first issuance from an Asian country since the pandemic hit.
The money raised will be used to finance the budget deficit, as well as fund COVID-19 relief and recovery efforts, it noted.
The Indonesian government faces the daunting task of funding the budget deficit of 6.34 percent of gross domestic product this year, with 695.2 trillion Rp (49 billion USD) set aside to bolster its economy and strengthen its health care system.
The government is planning to offer 900.4 trillion Rp worth of bonds in the second half of the year to fund the country’s response to the pandemic.
It had raised 630.5 trillion Rp worth of debt papers until June this year, including 4.3 billion USD from a three-tranche US-dollar bond in April and 2.5 billion USD from a three-tranche global sukuk (sharia-compliant bond) last month.
The joint lead arrangers of the above-mentioned Samurai bond issuance are Daiwa Securities, Nomura Securities, SMBC Nikko Securities and Mitsubishi UFJ Morgan Stanley Securities.
The government now expects the country’s full-year growth of only 1 percent under the baseline scenario in 2020 or full-year contraction of 0.4 percent in the worst-case scenario./.
VNA
