Costa Rica’s annual inflation rate turned negative in June after soaring to double digits last year, following a series of rate hikes, falling oil prices and a strong local currency, Bloomberg reported. Consumer prices fell 1.04% year-on-year in June, the biggest annual decline since March 2016. Prices rose as much as 12.1% in August 2022. Most of Costa Rica’s inflation was imported via goods, especially gasoline, Adriana Rodriguez, head of local brokerage Grupo Financiero Acobo, said.
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Costa Rica
Costa Rica has told the International Monetary Fund (IMF) it is interested in obtaining a nearly $700 million loan to invest in infrastructure from a newly created fund, the Central Bank said, Reuters reported. Costa Rican authorities told the IMF that the country aims to be the first to secure financing from the IMF's Resilience and Sustainability Trust (RST), announced in April, the Central Bank told Reuters on Friday.
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Costa Rican authorities executed dozens of searches and arrests Monday as part of a sprawling public corruption investigation centered on the awarding of road construction and maintenance contracts, the Associated Press reported. Walter Espinoza, director of the Judicial Investigation Organization, said it was one of the most impactful public corruption investigations ever. With bribes ranging from vehicles to properties, cash and personal favors, a group of private companies ensured that public officials helped them win and pad government contracts, Espinoza said. At 7 a.m.
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Costa Rica built Latin America’s model society, enacting universal health care and spending its way to one of the Western Hemisphere’s highest literacy rates. Now, it’s reeling from the financially crushing side effects of the coronavirus, as cratering revenue and crisis spending force a reckoning over a massive pile of government debt, the Washington Post reported. The pandemic is hurtling heavily leveraged nations into an economic danger zone, threatening to bankrupt the worst-affected.
Costa Rica’s legislative assembly on Monday approved the placement of up to $1.5 billion in bonds in coming months as the Central American country struggles to reduce its mounting debt burden, Reuters reported. Over the past 10 years, public debt in Costa Rica has doubled and now stands at about 53 percent of gross domestic product. The first tranche of the dollar bond debt issue will be placed in international markets from August, said Rocio Aguilar, Costa Rica’s finance minister. The government will have a year to complete the bond issue.
Philippine Deposit Insurance Corp. took over the Rural Bank of Parañaque, Inc. after the central bank ordered its closure on Monday. The receivership order, which meant the responsibility of recouping as much of the bank’s unpaid loans has been transferred to the state deposit insurer, was stated in Monetary Board Resolution 1616 issued on Monday. Central bank records showed the bank, known for its double-your-money-time-deposit scheme, has a capital deficiency of P983.5 million as of July 2007. RBPI has 37,400 deposit accounts worth P5.4 billion, of which P5 billion is insured.
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