Mixed developments

THE news is not all bad, though the outlook remains gloomy and will take at least a year to rectify. The stabilisation phase of economic management is drawing to a close. The government is making the right moves with plans for a debt buyback to retire a large amount of maturing Treasury bills, although one hopes this won’t simply be swapped with one debt instrument or another. The sheer size of the domestic debt, standing at slightly below 50 per cent of the total GDP (at current market prices), certainly makes it the elephant in the room, and it seems the government might finally be turning its attention to bringing this under control.