The administration has maintained its domestic borrowing program at P140 billion in February, but with longer tenors, data from the Bureau of the Treasury revealed.

According to an online advisory, the Treasury indicated that the national government will sell P80 billion worth of Treasury bills (T-bills) and P60 billion in Treasury bonds (T-bonds) in February 2021.

Next month’s total borrowing plan is the same as the P140 billion ceiling set for January.

The Treasury will hold a weekly auction for short-dated IOUs and offer longer tenor debt papers on a fortnightly basis.

The bureau will offer P5 billion worth of each 91- and 182-day T-bills as well as P10 billion of 364-day notes every Monday and issue them on February 3, 10, 17 and 24.

Likewise, the agency will issue P30 billion worth of 10-year and three-year T-bonds on February 4 and February 18, respectively.

Earlier, Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez III said the national government will borrow P3 trillion this year, the same level as last year’s financing program.

Of the P3 trillion, 75 percent of it will be sourced in the domestic market.

Dominguez said the government needed to maintain a P3 trillion borrowing level to scale up its COVID-19 response measures, which should allow to safely reopen the economy as well as roll out a comprehensive program to bounce back from the global economic shock.

In 2021, the government will maintain an elevated but manageable budget deficit of 8.9 percent on the back of strong government fiscal support in restarting the economy, Dominguez said. 

As of November last year, the outstanding debt of the national government reached P10.134-trillion, higher by 31 percent compared with P7.709-trillion in the same month in the previous year.

In the first 11-months of 2020, debt stock has grown by 31 percent owing to higher funding requirements to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic and other socio-economic measures.

Of the total outstanding debt stock, 71 were sourced externally while 29 percent were domestic debt.