The Bahraini Cabinet decided to raise the debt ceiling to 15 billion dinars (39.79 billion dollars) from 13 billion dinars to finance public spending, in light of the shrinking revenues due to low oil prices and the Coronavirus crisis.
The Council of Ministers announced that the decision to raise the debt ceiling also aims to pay other expenses and cover debt installments for the fiscal years from 2020 to 2022.
Bahrain raised the debt ceiling to 13 billion dinars in 2017, and according to the Council, raising the debt ceiling to provide the financial needs to finance the state's general budget expenditures and other expenditures and pay off the debt installments due for the remainder of the fiscal year 2020 and the next fiscal years 2021 and 2022, in a way that contributes to mitigating the economic effects resulting from the decrease in actual revenues collected due to the decline in oil prices in global markets that led to a decrease in oil revenues and a decrease in non-oil revenues due to the slowdown in economic activity at the global, regional and local levels due to the repercussions of the Coronavirus (COVID 19) pandemic.
Source (Al-Arabiya.net, Edited)
