Рublished in the Financial Times
By Kerin Hope and Theodor Troev in Sofia
There are warning signals everywhere, yet the European Union’s poorest member insists it can weather the global financial crisis.
Standard and Poor’s last month downgraded Bulgaria’s long-term debt to BBB. Fitch this month cut its rating to BBB- just one notch above junk bond status.
On Friday, the Bulgarian Industrial Association urged the finance ministry to redraft next year’s budget and cut the growth forecast from 4.7 per cent to 2 per cent of gross domestic product.
“We are witnessing an unprecedented global crisis… for the first time, the tensions in Bulgaria’s economy are caused not by internal but by foreign factors,” the association said.
However, Plamen Oresharski, the finance minister, rejects a suggestion that after bail-outs of Hungary and Ukraine by the International Monetary Fund, Bulgaria may be among the next in line.
“We are not in a similar position. Our banking system looks sound, with a good level of liquidity and healthy reserves,” he said. “Our concerns about the real economy are greater, but we still expect comparatively strong growth next year.”
Thanks to a record grain harvest, the economy is projected to expand this year by 6.9 per cent.
But the current account deficit – the highest in south-east Europe at about 24 per cent of GDP – appears unsustainable given an accelerating decline in foreign direct investment.
Investment inflows fell 48 per cent in the third quarter, according to central bank figures, following the collapse of a holiday-home construction bubble and a freeze on transfers by eurozone banks to their Bulgarian subsidiaries.
“Construction has been the most important growth driver, even more than in Spain, so the outlook is grave,” said Lubomir Christoff, a former chief economist at the central bank.
Sergey Stanishev, prime minister, has suggested Bulgaria should join the EU’s exchange rate mechanism next year. But although Bulgaria can point to a budget surplus and a low public debt (about 18 per cent of GDP), an annual inflation rate above 10 per cent rules out any chance of an early entry to the euro.
Mr Oresharski argues that an accumulated fiscal surplus of Lev12bn ($7.8bn, €6.2bn, £5.2bn) provides a cushion.
“One relief is that the government doesn’t have any short-term borrowing requirements,” he said.
In spite of rapid credit expansion since EU accession last year, total bank indebtedness is still low at about 30 per of GDP.
Lending is tight because foreign banks have lost access to funding from parent groups squeezed by the global credit crunch.
“We’ve been told to rely on our own resources, which means lending will slow,” said a senior executive at a foreign-owned bank.
Bulgaria’s currency board, which pegs the lev to the euro, is intended to eliminate foreign exchange risk. The arrangement also requires that money in circulation does not exceed central bank reserves.
With reserves at 180 per cent of currency in circulation, the lev was buttressed against an all-out attack on the currency board, Mr Oresharski said.
But other currency boards in the Baltics look less stable following Latvia’s request last week for EU help to fend off a crisis.