The Head of the Securities Commission, Abed Fadliah, along with other pro-regime figures, justified the regime’s decision to put treasury bonds up for sale. This comes amid various pretexts used after the regime announced an auction of government securities for the year 2022 to subscribe to two-year treasury bonds.
Fadliah claimed that this achieves several advantages, including reducing the volume of free liquidity in the market to reduce or curb inflation, inciting and motivating investment if the subscribers’ funds are used to establish productive projects, as well as the operation of stagnant funds and savings, which accelerates the production wheel and creates new job opportunities.
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Speaking to local pro-government media, economist Ali Mohammed said treasury bonds are one form of domestic debt that many countries prefer to finance their deficits over external debt, such as debt from the IMF and others, because of the risks that external debt may carry, in addition to accepting harsh conditions.
He considered that the regime government’s Ministry of Finance chose to issue treasury bonds as a form of insurance to fill part of the general budget deficit for the current year, which exceeded the 4,000 billion Syrian pounds. The ministry seemingly considered the option of treasury bonds as better than resorting to issuing more banknotes from the central bank, which would contribute to higher inflation rates.
Anas Ali, director of Public Revenues at the Ministry of Finance, estimated that the total value of this year’s expenditures would be between 500-700 billion Syrian pounds, a margin close to the total projected value of expenditures for 2022, which is 600 billion Syrian pounds.
He added that the ministry had doubled the value of government bonds issued compared with the 2020 fiscal year, which featured two bond auctions worth 300 billion Syrian pounds, each worth 150 billion Syrian pounds.
The ministry announced that the value of treasury bonds offered for subscription during the second auction would be an estimated 300 billion Syrian pounds.
This article was translated and edited by The Syrian Observer. The Syrian Observer has not verified the content of this story. Responsibility for the information and views set out in this article lies entirely with the author.
