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Weekly Lists
November 23, 2018 www.intellinews.com I Page 27
bne:Credit
Turkish companies’ debt load spread against emerging market peers ‘at highest level since 2007’
EBRD provides largest ever municipal loan in Belarus
The spread between the total debt-to-shareholder equity of companies trading on the MSCI Emerging Markets Index and those on Turkey’s benchmark Borsa Istanbul 100 Index (BIST-100) has hit the highest level since 2007, Bloomberg calculations show.
The calculations, giving a measure of just how very indebted Turkey’s companies are amid the country’s currency crisis and wider financial turmoil, were made based on third-quarter financial reports. The MSCI/BIST-100 debt load spread has reached 80 points in the year to date, whereas it stood just short of 60 points at the start of this year. In 2010, the spread was around 20 points.
The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) will provide a sovereign loan of €84mn to state-owned Minsk Vodo- kanal (MVK), the country’s biggest municipal water utility, which will be the largest loan in the municipal sector provided by the EBRD in Belarus to date.
The funding will help finance the rehabilitation and optimisation
of MVK’s wastewater treatment plant and the construction of a cost-efficient, modern sludge-management facility to ensure the company’s compliance with national and EU standards for effluent treatment quality, the multinational lender said in a statement on November 20.
The project will be co-financed by a parallel loan of the same amount provided by the European Investment Bank (EIB) which will be its first signed project in Belarus.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) said on November 20 that Albania needs to reduce the fiscal deficit so as to create fiscal buff- ers, as in case of adverse risks to economic growth there would be very limited space for fiscal stimulus.
The staff concluding statement followed the IMF mission to Tirana during November 6–20 for the annual Article IV consultation dis- cussions. The IMF projects that in the absence of additional meas- ures, the government deficit will remain close to 2% of GDP in 2018 and beyond.
IMF advises Albania to cut budget deficit further