Government borrowings skyrocketed last month as the coronavirus pandemic continued to strangle revenue sources, data from the Bureau of the Treasury showed.

Gross borrowings of the Duterte administration ballooned to P90.59 billion in September this year, nearly 9,000 percent higher compared with P1.01 billion in the same month last year, the Treasury reported.

Foreign financing stood at P40.57 billion in September, more than double than the P15.46 billion a year ago. Of the total, bulk were in program loans with P38.35 billion, and project loans with P2.22 billion.

The government’s domestic borrowings, meanwhile, reached P50.02 billion last month, a turnaround from a P14.45 billion net redemption in September last year.

Based on the Treasury data, local financing were mainly composed of long-term IOUs with P45 billion and short-dated noted with P5.02 billion.

The September borrowings brought the government’s first nine-month tally to a record P2.56 trillion, more than double of P917.28 billion in the same period last year.

At end-September, domestic borrowings soared to P2.010 trillion from P626.28 billion, while external financing jumped from P291 billion to P550.27 billion.

Earlier, Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez III said that borrowings for the year will be more than usual due to higher spending requirement for the coronavirus response and lower revenue collections due to slow economic activity.

As of August, the outstanding debt of the national government stood at P9.615-trillion, higher by 4.9 percent, or P451 billion, compared with the previous month’s level of P9.164-trillion.

Of the total debt stock, 69.8 percent are held by Filipino lenders, while 30.2 percent were sourced from foreign creditors.

The total debt as of August translates to roughly P87,409 debt share for every Filipino.

Since the beginning of the year, the government’s debt has risen by 24.4 percent, or P1.884 trillion.

In 2020, the Duterte administration expects the outstanding debt will hit more than P10 trillion.