The Parliamentary Finance Committee is expected to discuss the 2025 budget next November, amid a general trend to pass it easily and not amend it significantly, while the Prime Minister’s Advisor for Financial Affairs, Dr. Mazhar Muhammad Salih, stated that the 2024 budget that entered into force had a “precautionary deficit” of about 64 trillion dinars.
Salih said, in an interview with “Al-Sabah”: The average Iraqi oil sales for 2024 were estimated at no less than $75 per barrel, noting that the general financial need for “bridge loans” (which are short-term loans) to address the possibility of a deficit may not exceed 10 trillion dinars in all cases, which are borrowing amounts permitted under Law No. 13.
The financial advisor added that the country’s “financial life” in 2024 is proceeding smoothly, wondering, otherwise how did the Ministry of Finance issue 2024, in cooperation with the Central Bank of Iraq, “achievement bonds” for public subscription.
Saleh explained that these bonds are denominated in Iraqi dinars and come in multiple categories, including a category of 500,000 Iraqi dinars for two years with an annual return of 6.5%, indicating that these bonds are a safe investment, as the government is committed to paying the annual interest on them, and they are an integral part of bridging the deficit in the general budget for the year 2024, which means that they will come into effect.
In turn, economic researcher Ziad Al-Hashemi warned in an interview with “Al-Sabah” that the 2024 budget is facing pressures in terms of limited liquidity, noting that this has caused the government to be unable to spend the capital or investment budget, and to direct liquidity exclusively towards the operating budget.
Al-Hashemi continued that this mechanism has disrupted the implementation of the government’s development and service programs and has significantly disrupted them, expecting the deficit in the 2025 budget to increase with the decline in oil prices, below $70 as a result of the decline in global demand for oil.
He expected that it would cause financial hardship and a weakening of the ability to spend if the decline in oil revenues continued for periods exceeding two quarters, indicating that the hardship might force the government to return to borrowing internally and externally, in the hope that oil prices would rise again in the near future.
alsabaah.iq
