Portugal Makes Early Repayment to IMF

Portugal has made an early repayment of €1 billion ($1.14 billion) to the International Monetary Fund and intends to repay a further €2.6 billion of bailout loans by August, the government said Friday, AFP reported. As part of a bailout in 2011, Portugal was loaned €29.6 billion by the IMF, more than half of which has already been repaid. But Lisbon aims to reduce interest on borrowings with further early payments. The IMF interest currently stands at 4.6%, compared to available market rates of 3% over 10 years. “The early repayment to the IMF is significant in improving the viability of debt by reducing its cost,” the finance ministry said in a statement. Once the next €2.6 billion sum is repaid, €10.4 billion of debt will remain to be repaid, according to the government. Portugal is riding the wave of the eurozone recovery with a pickup in investment and expanding exports that are expected to lift growth by 2.5% this year, the former bailout country’s best performance for more than two decades, the IMF Fund said on Friday.