Philippines defers OFW bond plan

• Posted by admin on August 8th, 2008 filed in What's New

MANILA, Philippines—The Philippines has put on hold its plan to offer Treasury bonds for overseas Filipino workers as the reversal of the peso uptrend — which previously diluted the local currency equivalent of foreign exchange remittances — made this project a less urgent concern this year.

“It’s not exactly dead. We can still do that, but not now,” National Treasurer Roberto Tan told reporters Monday.

Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas Deputy Governor Diwa Guinigundo said in a separate interview: “As far as we’re concerned, we’re still discussing how to provide some assistance to the OFWs.”

“It can be through a bond flotation and the proceeds can be used to provide funds for housing. It’s another issue for the national government to decide on whether this will form part of fund-raising for 2008. It can be done in 2009,” Guinigundo said.

Other government sources said the planned OFW bond offer was deferred because the Bureau of Treasury had instead seen strong demand for peso-denominated Retail Treasury Bonds (RTBs), a recent offering of which raised P70 billion for the national treasury.
Out of the total funds raised from the RTBs, a hefty P60 billion was snapped up by retail investors, while the remaining P10 billion went to government-owned and -controlled corporations like the Social Security System, and the Government Service Insurance System.

read more: http://globalnation.inquirer.net/news/breakingnews/view/20080804-152621/Philippines-defers-OFW-bond-plan