According to the Association of Banks in Lebanon (ABL), Lebanon’s gross public debt reached $71.48B by May 2016, which shows an increase of 3.03% from May 2015 and 1.66% as of December 2015.
Debt in local currency, LBP, which takes up around 60% of the gross public debt, increased by 0.82% y-o-y to $42.48B, while debt in foreign currency rose 6.46% from $27.24B to $29.0B.
Lebanese commercial banks were the largest holders of local currency debt, with a share of 45%, whereas the BDL and other non-financial sectors held the remaining shares of 38% and 17%, respectively. Meanwhile, 92.6% of foreign currency debt was in the form of Eurobonds, 3.6% in the form of multilateral loans, and 3.5% and 0.2% in the form of bilateral loans and Paris II loans.
The Net Public Debt, which excludes the public sector deposits at the Commercial banks and BDL, stood at $62.71B in May 2016, increasing by a yearly 5.62%.
Local Currency Debt by Type of Holder
Source: ABL