Economist: It Is Almost Impossible to Pay the External Debt of Belarus From the Budget

• 6.11.2021, 10:44

The country's financial system was on the brink of default.

What is the state of affairs with the foreign debt of Belarus? Economist Lev Lvovsky told about this Filin.

- In 2021, everything looks pretty stable and calm here. However, starting next year, the authorities will again have to pay off several billion dollars of foreign debt annually on schedule.

Technically, Belarus will be able to pay this amount in 2022 without any loans: we have 7 billion in gold and foreign exchange reserves. But of course, we can't do that. And the authorities, most likely, will not, since this is a very significant decrease in the gold reserves, from which the stability of the entire system may suffer.

Formally, right now, there is no resolution of the issue of external debt for 2022. It will be quite problematic to close this issue without additional loans.

The authorities are constantly negotiating with Russia precisely on the issue of additional debt. The figure sounds like 3.5 billion dollars, but the eastern neighboring country does not agree to issue new loans so far.

Nevertheless, the talk about this does not subside. And if Russia itself or through the Eurasian Bank gives the Belarusian regime this money, the problem of debt will not affect us again and will be postponed for at least another year.

In short, the state external debt now lives in such a system: in order to pay it off, you need to take new loans. The budget for 2022 itself is planned with a deficit, so it will be almost impossible to pay such a large amount from its revenues.