Serbia Receives Emergency IMF Loan

Tirana, Jan. 19, 2008 (AE) – The International Monetary Fund, IMF, approved a €402.5 million or US$530.3 Stand-By Arrangement to support Serbian economy, the fund said in a press release in Saturday.

“The authorities’ program aims at safeguarding macroeconomic and financial stability, in view of the global financial turmoil. It focuses on measures aimed at maintaining market confidence, complementing the large buffers in the financial system. Policies include upfront fiscal restraint, with the 2009 deficit limited to 1¾ percent of GDP; containing inflation, while maintaining a managed float to facilitate external adjustment; strengthening crisis preparedness; and reforms to boost the economy’s supply side”, IMF said.

The Serbian market is experiencing the pinch of the global financial crisis, and the government in Belgrade is trying to introduce measures that will allow it to ease the impact of the credit crunch.

To win IMF support, Serbia must cut its budget deficit from this year’s 2.7 percent of GDP to 1.5 percent in 2009.

Serbian Dinar value shrinked to 86.8 dinar per Euro in November, from its high in June of 75.8, despite multimillion Euro interventions from the Serbian Central Bank to halt the slide.

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Posted by editor on Jan 19 2009. Filed under Banking & Finance, Region. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry